Sunday evening the investigative reporters for the New York Times who have been studying Trump’s taxes released a major story after receiving access to Trump’s tax returns: “The New York Times has obtained tax-return data extending over more than two decades for Mr. Trump and the hundreds of companies that make up his business organization, including detailed information from his first two years in office.”
There are many key findings, starting with the fact he paid no income tax for 10 years, and only $750 in 2016 and 2017. He is also financially insecure with a lot of debt: Now, with his financial challenges mounting, the records show that he depends more and more on making money from businesses that put him in potential and often direct conflict of interest with his job as president.
Some caveats: They comprise information that Mr. Trump has disclosed to the I.R.S., not the findings of an independent financial examination. They report that Mr. Trump owns hundreds of millions of dollars in valuable assets, but they do not reveal his true wealth. Nor do they reveal any previously unreported connections to Russia.
-his financial condition when he announced his run for president in 2015 lends some credence to the notion that his long-shot campaign was at least in part a gambit to reanimate the marketability of his name.
-within the next four years, more than $300 million in loans — obligations for which he is personally responsible — will come due.
His properties have become bazaars for collecting money directly from lobbyists, foreign officials and others seeking face time, access or favor; the records for the first time put precise dollar figures on those transactions.
When he took office, Mr. Trump said he would pursue no new foreign deals as president. Even so, in his first two years in the White House, his revenue from abroad totaled $73 million.
There are new details about his audit, which stem from a tax windfall he orchestrated when he declared a loss from the Atlantic City casino: If the auditors ultimately disallow Mr. Trump’s $72.9 million federal refund, he will be forced to return that money with interest, and possibly penalties, a total that could exceed $100 million.
Election 2020
In the first Biden-Trump debate Tuesday night, Trump was asked to condemn white supremacists and right wing militias. First he asked the moderator to be specific, and when the Proud Boys were named he said “Proud Boys, stand back and stand by!”
Frum on the debate: Trump yelled, threatened, interrupted—and changed nothing. All he did was confirm the horror and the revulsion of the large American majority that has already begun to cast its ballots against him.
Correction: Trump did one thing. On the Cleveland stage, Trump communicated that he will seize any opportunity to disrupt the vote, and resist the outcome. He communicated more forcefully than ever that the only security the country has for a constitutional future is that Biden wins by the largest possible margin.
GOP leaders distanced themselves from Trump’s remarks: Tim Scott: “White supremacy should be denounced at every turn. I think he misspoke, I think he should correct it. If he doesn’t correct it I guess he didn’t misspeak.”
McConnell: “With regard to the white supremacy issue, I want to associate myself with the remarks of Tim Scott,” Mr. McConnell said. “He said it was unacceptable not to condemn white supremacists and so I do so in the strongest possible way.”
COVID-19
New York Times reports: Top White House officials pressured the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention this summer to play down the risk of sending children back to school… also tried to circumvent the C.D.C. in a search for alternate data showing that the pandemic was weakening and posed little danger to children.
Thursday night news broke that Hope Hicks tested positive for COVID-19. Early Friday morning, at 12:54am, Trump tweeted: Tonight, @FLOTUS and I tested positive for COVID-19. We will begin our quarantine and recovery process immediately. We will get through this TOGETHER!
Jonathan Swan in Politico Saturday late afternoon: What is the actual state of President Trump’s health — now and over the past 24 hours?
Why it matters: It’s one of the most high-stakes questions in the world, and I cannot answer it, despite having spent since 5 a.m. on Friday on my phone with sources inside and close to the White House.
On Friday night, we chose not to publish information we’d learned from well-placed sources who told us the president had experienced a fever and was worse than the White House was letting on.
minutes after the doctors’ press conference, something extraordinary happened that crystallized this White House’s credibility gap, and made a mockery of any reporter trying to responsibly cover this president’s condition.
The White House reporter on pool duty — traveling with the president and delivering official dispatches to reporters at numerous outlets — sent this dispatch, quoting “a source familiar with the president’s health”:
The president’s vitals over the last 24 hours were very concerning and the next 48 hours will be critical in terms of his care. We’re still not on a clear path to a full recovery.
That was a much more worrisome portrait. The source, identified by AP, was White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, who was shown on camera asking the pool to “go off the record with some of y’all.”
I have tried to get a straight answer from the White House since then about what is going on, and why we are being fed official contradictions.
Here is how the Washington Post described it: The statement from Meadows was originally distributed to the media through a White House pool report and was attributed to “a source familiar with the president’s health.” Two White House officials familiar with the statement, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the issue, later said it was Meadows who spoke with reporters. Meadows was also seen on camera pulling reporters aside to talk after the news conference ended. The Associated Press, which had a reporter at the event, also later identified Meadows as the source of the comment.
…
Several White House aides also said they also did not have confidence in what they were being told by other officials.
“I can tell you what I am hearing, but I honestly have no idea if it’s right,” said one senior administration official close to the president. “A lot of people aren’t even telling other people in the building the truth.”
Saturday night the White House released staged photos of Trump working — signing blank sheets of paper in two different rooms taken 10 minutes apart. There was also a video of Trump speaking to the camera that was edited to remove his coughs.
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Trump’s Job Approval: 44%
COVID-19 Cases / Deaths: 7,310,625 / 208,118