Trump tax returns handed over to Democratic-led congressional committee

Former President Donald Trump’s tax returns have finally been handed over to a Democratic-led congressional committee, ending his years-long effort to keep them away from lawmakers.

Six years of Trump’s tax forms and other documents have been delivered to the House Ways and Means Committee days after the Supreme Court turned down an appeal by the former president, the Treasury Department said Wednesday.

The handover came just a month before Democrats hand over control of the panel to Republicans, who retook the House with a narrow win in the midterm elections.

It’s unclear how much if anything the public will find out about what’s in Trump’s taxes.

Rep. Richard Neal (D-Mass.), the Ways and Means Committee chairman, insisted Wednesday he will not simply sit on the records.

“I intend to see this through,” Neal said.

Neal has said the panel needed the returns to see how the Internal Revenue Service handles the taxes of presidents and whether any new laws might be needed.

With just a few days to go before lawmakers head home for a holiday recess, it’s unlikely that Democrats will be able to push any new legislation through Congress.

But Neal could issue a report about the documents or publish some of Trump’s closely guarded financial secrets in the congressional record.

Trump has fought for years to keep his taxes under wraps. He repeatedly claimed that he couldn’t release his tax returns because he was being audited by the IRS, a claim he failed to back up with any evidence.

Trump was the first presidential candidate in decades not to release his tax returns in 2016 during his successful presidential run.

Democrats first launched a push to obtain Trump’s taxes when they took control of the House in 2019. Trump’s Treasury Department balked at handing them over despite a law that says it “shall” hand over any returns requested by Congress.

The congressional committee won repeated victories in court, punctuated by last week’s final rejection of Trump’s appeal by the conservative Supreme Court.