The Treasury Secretary told Sen. Coons that he did not discuss or take any directions from the White House in making his decision of refusing to supply Trump's tax returns to the House ways and means committee
Sen. Coon read the tax code back to Mnuchin, saying, "the treasury secretary shall furnish such committee with any return or return information specified with the request.
"This has historically been a function delegated to the IRS commissioner, was there a reason you didn't trust the IRS Commissioner to handle this..."
"Was there a meeting between the IRS and treasury leaders directing the IRS to stand aside or stand down on this?"
Coons continued, “And have you discussed Chairman Neal’s request with the president or anyone in the White House? Did you get any direction on how to handle this matter from the president?”
I thought Sen. Coons should have broken this multi-question up into sections so he could get more pointed answers from Mnuchin.
“First, I have not discussed this with the president or anybody in the White House," Mnuchin said.
"I just want to clarify one of the things I publicly said earlier is with our legal department originally early on in this process, before we received any request, okay, did have a discussion but it was not to seek guidance or anything else and that was way before we received any request and that was just in the legal department.”
He continued, “I have not had any discussions with the president or taken any direction from him or anybody else in the White House on this issue.”
He then said he had a responsibility to supervise the IRS Commissioner and the IRS. And he said he takes his job very seriously towards any taxpayer which of course is all lies the only taxpayer he is worried about his trial Trump.
“I have had many conversations with our legal department and the IRS’s legal department to make sure that we’re interpreting these issues correctly.”
Trump's treasury secretary told Mr. Coons that the IRS Commissioner concurs with his decisions. The IRS commissioner owns and rents out a Trump-branded property in Hawaii.
And we know from Michael Cohen how Trump gives orders.
