WASHINGTON, Nov 21 — Donald Trump said today he would publish information about his finances before next year’s presidential election, as Democrats and prosecutors try to get his tax returns against his will.
Trump, 73, did not specify which financial documents he would release or exactly when the long-awaited publication would happen.
“The Witch Hunt continues with local New York Democrat prosecutors going over every financial deal I have ever done. This has never happened to a President before,” he tweeted.
“What they are doing is not legal. But I’m clean, and when I release my financial statement (my decision) sometime prior to Election, it will only show one thing — that I am much richer than people even thought,” he added.
Trump broke with a presidential norm during the 2016 contest by refusing to release his tax returns as most presidents have done since the 1970s even though it is not required by law.
He claims that his tax returns are under audit by the Internal Revenue Service.
His lawyers have approached the Supreme Court seeking to block two separate rulings that require he hand them over to a congressional committee in the Democratic-led House of Representatives and to a Democratic prosecutor in New York.
Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr is investigating payments made by Michael Cohen, Trump’s former personal attorney, to Stormy Daniels, an adult film actress who claimed to have had a sexual liaison with Trump before he ran for president in 2016.
Cohen is currently serving three years in prison after admitting paying hush money — in violation of campaign finance laws — to Daniels and another woman, tax fraud, and lying to Congress.
A federal appeals court in New York earlier this month ordered the accountancy firm Mazars USA to release eight years of Trump’s tax returns in regards to the investigation, leading his attorneys to approach the Supreme Court. — AFP
