On Tuesday evening, The New York Times released a blockbuster report detailing that from 1985 to 1994, President Donald Trump and his business lost $1.17 billion and may also have engaged in tax fraud to avoid paying taxes:
“The numbers show that in 1985, Mr. Trump reported losses of $46.1 million from his core businesses — largely casinos, hotels and retail space in apartment buildings. They continued to lose money every year, totaling $1.17 billion in losses for the decade.
“In fact, year after year, Mr. Trump appears to have lost more money than nearly any other individual American taxpayer, The Times found when it compared his results with detailed information the I.R.S. compiles on an annual sampling of high-income earners. His core business losses in 1990 and 1991 — more than $250 million each year — were more than double those of the nearest taxpayers in the I.R.S. information for those years.
As we’ve long suspected, Donald Trump is a complete failure as a businessman. He’s a con man and a cheat.
But while the tax information is certainly an embarrassment to the president, it also suggests that Trump has long been desperate for financial assistance to even keep the Trump Organization afloat. With such massive losses year after year, Trump may have had to turn to questionable financiers in order to make ends meet. And those sources could well have been foreign counties such as Russia, China, or Saudi Arabia.
And that, former federal prosecutor Renato Mariotti warned on Twitter, endangers the United States because it leaves Trump open to blackmail:
What is Trump’s financial condition now? Is he in the red? Could he be vulnerable to blackmail?
We don’t know because he has hidden his tax returns from Congress and the public. https://t.co/6KpQ3qSszA
— Renato Mariotti (@renato_mariotti) May 7, 2019
All of this proves yet again why every presidential candidate should be required by law to release his or her taxes. If they don’t, they shouldn’t be allowed on the ballot. It’s just that simple.
Featured Image Via CNBC
