Emoluments Hearing Hints At What May Be At Stake: Trump's Tax Returns
By Peter Overby
NPR "Politics" 10/18/17
Link:http://www.npr.org/2017/10/18/558623341/emoluments-hearing-hints-at-what-may-be-at-stake-trumps-tax-returns?utm_source=npr_newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_content=20171021&utm_campaign=politics&utm_term=nprnews
If there's one thing President Trump's critics want from him, and he refuses to give up, it's his tax returns.
The returns didn't come up during Wednesday's hearing in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in Manhattan. But the hearing was the first step in a process that could loosen Trump's grip on them.
If the next step goes the plaintiffs' way, the case could make the president's tax returns surface. Trump is being sued by four plaintiffs who allege he is violating anti-corruption provisions in the Constitution, namely, its Foreign and Domestic Emoluments clauses.
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If Judge George Daniels says the plaintiffs have legal standing to proceed with the suit, they then can seek internal financial documents, including those tax returns.
"We will be looking for detailed financial records, foreign and domestic transactions, in the president's businesses," plaintiffs' lawyer Joseph Sellers told reporters after the hearing. "If the tax returns turn out to be relevant we may seek them."
Trump is the only president since 1977 to withhold his tax returns from voluntary disclosure. Unlike recent presidents, he has also refused to comply voluntarily with the federal conflict-of-interest law. Doing so would have forced him to separate himself from the Trump business empire.
So maybe we're finally going to see those tax returns, eh Cheeto? Have have you been hiding?
= new reply since forum marked as read
Democrats have tried to bring it to a vote a number of times but Ryan blocked every one.
On CBS This Morning,... asked "how President Trump can promise that his tax-cut plan won’t benefit him personally when the public can’t see Trump’s tax returns. Ryan replied, “I don’t know the answer to your question, Gayle! Heh!” Ryan chuckled, throwing up his hands. “I don’t know exactly how his businesses are structured!” he said, continuing to laugh and shrug his shoulders at the great mystery of it."
Bet he isn't chuckling over this case behind the cameras. 
It seems he's being sued in New York over the use of his New York hotels. Foreign agents & lobbyists are paying Trump to stay at his hotels and then do government business with him. (conflict of interest and emoluments)
Apparently there's a separate case in Washington DC where some of the DC hotels are suing Trump over his recent ownership of Washington DC Trump International Hotel. (It's the one pictured here.) He literally bought this building while he was campaigning for President, and he agreed that if he won he would divest himself of the ownership. Needless to say he hasn't divested anything. (unfair competition, conflict of interest and emoluments.)
