Trump’s leaked tax records fuel attacks

Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump declared a nearly billion-dollar loss in 1995 and theoretically could have avoided paying federal income taxes for up to 18 years, according to leaked tax records.

Over the weekend, The New York Times published three pages of Trump’s tax records, claiming it got the documents in the mail from an anonymous source. The unsubstantiated returns show Trump lost $916 million in 1995 and, according to tax experts hired by the Times, the Republican presidential nominee could have used the loss to legally avoid paying taxes for nearly two decades.

Since the documents’ release, the Trump campaign has not refuted any of their contents. Instead, his campaign released a statement saying Trump is a highly skilled businessman who will pay no more tax than legally required.

“The only news here is that the more than 20-year-old alleged tax document was illegally obtained,” Trump said yesterday.

He then attempted to spin the news into a positive message for his campaign.

“I know our complex tax laws better than anyone who has ever run for president and am the only one who can fix them,” he tweeted.

The huge financial loss likely stems from Trump’s poor financial dealings in the early 1990s, when he mismanaged casinos in Atlantic City and sank millions into a failed airline business. Because of a lucrative tax deduction allowed for some businesses that have a net operating loss, Trump could have legally avoided paying taxes until 2010.

But no one can confirm whether Trump took advantage of the tax law, unless he releases his full tax returns. Trump has so far refused to do that, claiming his financials are under a routine audit and his lawyers have advised him not to make them public. His decision goes against a long-standing practice for presidential candidates to provide financial transparency. Every presidential nominee since 1976 has released tax returns.

Grover Norquist, founder of Americans for Tax Reform, told me the leaked documents do more to discredit the credibility of The New York Times than Trump’s candidacy.

“The way they reported this was incredibly dishonest,” Norquist said, noting the accusation against Trump, based on the information, is 100 percent theoretical. And even if true, Norquist said Trump was well within his legal rights: “[The Times] is extrapolating for political gain.”

During the first presidential debate, Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton said Trump doesn’t want to release his returns because he doesn’t want Americans to know he’s taken advantage of laws to pay fewer taxes.

“That makes me smart,” he replied.

Trump surrogates reiterated that message over the weekend, saying news of his 1995 tax records simply shows Trump knows how to benefit from a flawed system.

“This is a very, very good story for Trump,” New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said on Fox News Sunday. “There’s no one who’s shown more genius in their way to maneuver around the tax code and to rightfully use the laws to do that.”

The Clinton campaign quickly pounced on the news, saying the leaked documents are a colossal bombshell for the Trump campaign.

“Despite losing a billion dollars, Trump wants to reward himself with more tax breaks on inherited wealth while stiffing middle-class families who earn their paychecks with hard work,” Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said in a statement. “[Republicans] have put party so far ahead of country, they’ve endorsed a racist, incompetent failure who managed to lose a billion dollars in a boom year.”

Trump’s taxes have been a central talking point for Clinton and her supporters in recent weeks. She frequently brings up Trump’s lack of financial transparency on the campaign trial, insinuating he’s hiding something.

“It doesn’t matter; this argument is a distraction,” Norquist told me. “Hillary Clinton wants to raise taxes by trillions and Trump wants to cut them—we need to focus on what’s important.”