Would a tax cheat lie? Yes. Yes, he would.

When Donald Trump first began his presidential campaign back in June 2015, he promised he’d release his tax returns to the public which is a normal thing for presidential candidates to do. But then, he withheld them claiming that he couldn’t release them because he was being audited and you can’t release your taxes during that process. Of course, that is a lie.

Every president since Nixon has released his tax returns to the public except for Gerald Ford. Every president has been under an audit while doing so. It’s not a law that every president is audited, but an internal rule at the Internal Revenue Service. Everyone knew Trump was lying about not being able to release his returns during an audit. What we didn’t know was that he was lying about the audit.

For Trump’s first two years as president (sic), he was not under any audit. Why did the IRS take it easier on Trump than it did on previous presidents? The report from the Joint Committee on Taxation (JCT), a bipartisan congressional panel that examined Trump’s tax returns from 2015-20, says the IRS gave Tiny a break because he used professional accountants for his returns.

Do you really believe all the other presidents did their own taxes? I can’t see Reagan going over his returns and asking, “Mommy, are jellybeans tax deductible?”.

Just as the Secret Service made special rules for Trump, so did the IRS. Trump, who claims he’s treated so unfairly received special treatment that was denied to previous presidents. Other presidents released their tax returns. Other presidents sold their businesses in order not to violent the Emoluments Clause. Other presidents paid taxes.

The House Ways and Means Committee voted along party lines to release six years of Trump’s taxes, where we learned that the IRS gave Trump a pass for his first two years and didn’t conduct an audit until the Ways and Means Chair, Congressman Richard Neal, sent an inquiry about Trump’s taxes to the IRS. In fact, they started the first audit on the same day Neal made his request which was in 2019.

We learned a few years ago from a New York Times report that Trump had very low tax liabilities, and the release from the JCT confirmed it. We learned that Trump paid nothing in tax in 2020, $558,000 in 2019, $5.3 million in 2018, and nothing again in 2017.

How does a billionaire avoid paying taxes? By losing money. In 2015, Trump claimed he lost $76 million in “other income.” In 2020, Trump made more than $10.6 million in taxable interest. The same year, he reported a $15 million loss from his rental real estate properties and other ventures. He claims his total income for 2020 was a $4.7 million LOSS.

There’s a bunch of fishy stuff in his taxes, like loans to his kids and interest payments he received from them. A great way to avoid the high gift tax is to make a loan, and then your kids can claim those interest payments on their taxes.

There are also earnings that exactly match expenses. For example, the was one gross income of $680,886 and expenses that also totaled $680,886. There was one for Melania where she took in $3,848 from a modeling job and reported the same amount of expenses. One speaking gig paid Trump $50,000, and his travel expense to get there was $46,162. I’m not a stable genius businessman like Trump claims he is, and has fake-written books about it, but I always had the impression that businesses were in business to turn a profit. Why would someone bother with a business in which their expenses consumed every dollar they made? Trump once said his taxes were too complicated for us to understand and maybe he’s right because I don’t understand the no-profit thing.

Republicans, who will have the majority next year, are upset over the release of Trump’s tax returns and some are promising to use the Ways and Means Committee to seek revenge by going after President Biden’s tax returns. The only problem with that is President Biden has released at least 20 years of his tax returns. Another option is to release Hunter Biden’s tax returns, although that may be illegal. Nobody has released the tax returns of Trump’s trust fund babies.

Republicans fear releasing Trump’s tax returns has set a precedent, although that precedent already existed until Trump broke it…and he lied while doing so.

Donald Trump is a fraud and that’s why he didn’t want his returns released. He didn’t want the public to see he’s not really a billionaire, a lousy businessman, and potentially a tax cheat. Trump can’t claim he’s a great businessman without being a tax cheat, because great businessmen don’t lose money year after year. So either he sucks at business…or he’s lying on his taxes.

There is no law that presidential candidates must release their taxes, but there should be. Trump is running again and he’s made no mention of showing his most recent tax returns.

Richard Nixon said the public has the right to know that their president is not a crook. But we already knew that Trump was one.

Facebook Suspension Update: There are 19 days left in my Facebook suspension for typing the word “Taliban.” Here’s Quannah’s countdown clock.

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