Earlier this month, House Ways and Means Committee chairman Richard Neal formally asked the IRS to provide six years of Prznint McGrifter’s personal tax returns, and the returns of some of his bidnesses, to Democrats who are investigating his financial dealings and possible conflicts of interest. Allegedly, there are many!
Today is the deadline that Neal set for the IRS to turn them over.
The White House suggested it would put Strategic Hire AG Bill ‘Low’ Barr on the case, and (acting) chief-of-staff Mick Mulvaney told Fox News viewers there will be ice cream in hell before the Dims would ever see his tax returns.
In the quaint, real world, the White House, the AG, Mulvaney, even Prznint Stupid hisself don’t have a say in this. The only person who does is Treasury Secretary and living typo Steven Mnuchin, who is ready to prove to da boss that he is a mensch. “Steve ‘the mensch’ Mnuchin has a nice ring to it, huh, Donnie, huh?,” he didn’t fawn. Probably.
In testimony before two different House committees, Mnuchin said that he did not expect to meet the deadline. In his testimony, Mnuchin also told us that his toadies and minions had consulted with White House counsel Pat Cipollone. Unethical, certainly; illegal probably, but you know: mensch. Can’t touch that, as MC Hammer once sang.
But he did sneer at Auntie Maxine.
Anyway, back to the matter at hand. Vox interviewed a bunch of law professors, and they unanimously agreed that Prznint Stupid didn’t have an orange leg to stand on, legally speaking. The 1924 law is as straight forward as can be.
As we know lawyers argue the facts of the case, when the facts are on their side. When the facts are NOT on their side, they argue the law.
Watch that space.
We expect to see all sorts of pontificating poltroons declare that it is unconstitutional and a power grab. Neal, who is not a dummy, laid out the case for both oversight and legislation in his letter to the IRS, and those are the jobs of Congress, so asking for tax returns is not a power grab or unconstitutional. Anyway, expect this to get to those unelected men in black robes (and women – why do Republicans always forget that there are women?) to weigh in. Probably after ‘skis with Squi.
So here’s how it will probably play out: it will be dragged out until after the 2020 Goat Rodeo. If Putin wins a second term, then Chief Justice John Roberts gets to be a tiebreaker; if Putin loses, well, Comrade Trump’s tax returns are probably moot.
Crossposted from Mock Paper Scissors
