Supreme Court decision: Trump loses dispute over tax documents

Ex-President Trump has suffered a defeat in a dispute over his tax returns in the US Supreme Court: The court paved the way for the presentation of his documents before a committee of the House of Representatives.

The US Supreme Court has cleared the way for ex-President Donald Trump’s tax records to be handed over to a congressional committee. The Supreme Court denied a request by Trump’s attorneys to stop the tax documents from being sent to the Democrat-controlled House Finance Committee. The Supreme Court did not give a reason for this decision.

A year-long legal battle

The House Finance Committee has been trying to get hold of the documents for years. During Trump’s administration, the Treasury Department refused to release the documents and accused the committee of partisan maneuvers. Former businessman Trump was the first president in four decades not to publish his tax returns, as is customary in the United States. Critics therefore suspect that he has something to hide.

It was only in the government of Trump’s successor Joe Biden last year that the ministry finally instructed the IRS to hand over the documents to the committee. Trump fought back in court and eventually petitioned an appeals court in Washington to stop it. The court rejected this in a first round in August. Trump then requested a re-examination, which was also rejected in October. That left him with a trip to the US Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court also initially stopped the release of the documents in early November in response to an urgent request from Trump’s lawyers and gave both sides the opportunity to comment. In the end, however, the Supreme Court paved the way for the disclosure of the papers.

A last minute success

It is a last-minute success for the committee: Since the Republicans won the majority in the US midterm elections and will be in charge there from the beginning of January, the Democratic-led body had little time to do anything about the matter .

Trump is currently involved in various legal disputes – including because of taking secret government documents to his private estate after leaving the White House. The Supreme Court’s decision comes just a week after Trump announced that he would run again as the Republican presidential candidate in the 2024 election.