WASHINGTON -- The Treasury Department said Wednesday that it would not immediately comply with a congressional request to hand over President Donald Trump's tax returns, setting up a protracted legal battle between two branches of government.
Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin said in a letter to Rep. Richard Neal, D-Mass., the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, that the Treasury Department's lawyers needed more time to assess the lawfulness of the request and expressed concern that it would be a violation of taxpayer privacy.
Mnuchin did not say how much time the review would take but conveyed concerns about whether Congress has authority to review the records.
"The committee's request raises serious issues concerning the constitutional investigative authority, the legitimacy of the asserted legislative purpose and the constitutional rights of American citizens," Mnuchin wrote. "The legal implications of this request could affect protections for all Americans against politically motivated disclosures of tax information, regardless of which party is in power."
Neal said in a statement Wednesday that he "will consult with counsel and determine the appropriate response to the [IRS commissioner, Charles Rettig,] in the coming days."
The Treasury Department was facing a midnight deadline to respond to a letter sent last week by Neal, who issued a formal request for the president's tax records from 2013 to 2018, as well as information related to a trust that controls more than 100 other businesses in Trump's empire.
The request cited a 1924 federal law that states the Internal Revenue Service "shall furnish" the records at the request of lawmakers tasked with tax oversight.
Neal is expected to send a follow-up letter demanding the tax returns and outlining potential next steps, which could include a subpoena or a lawsuit.
Trump said Wednesday that he would not turn over his tax returns because they remained under audit by the IRS, signaling a long fight ahead.
The president, who has cited IRS audits since the 2016 presidential campaign, made clear he would continue to use that as a reason not to release his tax records, even though no law prevents a taxpayer from releasing returns while under audit.
"I would love to give them, but I'm not going to do it while I'm under audit," Trump told reporters before departing for a trip to Texas. "I have no obligation to do that while under audit, and no lawyer would tell you to release your tax returns while you're under audit."
White House officials have called the request a political fishing expedition, and Mnuchin has cautioned that furnishing the returns could open the floodgates to weaponizing the IRS.
Mnuchin signaled his intention Tuesday, when he told members of Congress that the president had no legal obligation to make his tax returns public. While Mnuchin insisted he would follow the law, he also defended Trump's right to keep his tax returns private.
During a moderated discussion Wednesday at the International Monetary Fund, Mnuchin reiterated his position that the privacy of taxpayers, including that of the president, was paramount.
"We are going to respond carefully. We need to make sure that the IRS and individual taxpayer information does not just become subject to political winds," Mnuchin said, adding that he had been consulting with the Justice Department on the matter. "Whether it is this party or a different party over time, I take the obligation very seriously to make sure that we follow the law correctly."
Mnuchin acknowledged that White House lawyers had been in touch with the Treasury Department about the matter before Neal made his formal request last week. Mnuchin said he had not personally spoken to Trump about the request.
Democrats cried foul, saying any White House involvement in the Treasury Department's decision-making raised the risk of improper political involvement. The reason federal law says the treasury secretary "shall furnish" tax returns requested by Congress is because the system is designed to block any involvement from the White House.
Attorneys for the president have argued Neal's request risks using the IRS for partisan political aims, arguing House Democrats are engaged in a "gross abuse of power" that infringes on taxpayer privacy. These arguments have been echoed in House hearings by congressional Republicans.
"The requests for [Trump's] private tax information are not consistent with governing law, do not advance any proper legislative purpose, and threaten to interfere with the ordinary conduct of audits," said William Consovoy, Trump's attorney, in a statement. "We are confident that this misguided attempt to politicize the administration of the tax laws will not succeed."
White House acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney has said that Democrats would never obtain Trump's tax returns.
Trump broke with decades of precedent when he declined to release his returns during the 2016 campaign.
Rettig, the IRS commissioner, said Tuesday at a congressional hearing that no rules prohibited taxpayers who are under audit from releasing their tax returns. But, in a 2016 column in Forbes, Rettig, then a private attorney, said no "experienced tax lawyer" would advise Trump to publicly release his tax returns during an audit.
The tax returns of presidents are automatically audited. After Democrats took control of the House this year, Neal decided to use the 1924 provision in the tax code that allows the chairman of the tax-writing committee to gain access to the returns of any taxpayer. Neal said Trump's returns were needed so the committee could assess how the IRS was auditing presidential returns.
Republicans have argued that this rationale is suspect, pointing out that Democrats only asked for Trump's returns and that there are other methods that could be used to study the auditing practices at the IRS.
Information for this article was contributed by Alan Rappeport of The New York Times; by Jeff Stein and Damian Paletta of The Washington Post; and by Andrew Taylor and Jonathan Lemire of The Associated Press.
A Section on 04/11/2019