Democrats ask Senate Finance Committee to review Trump's tax returns

(Image credit: Mandel Ngan/Getty Images)

last updated 2 March 2017

In a letter to the Senate Finance Committee sent Wednesday, seven Democratic senators asked that the panel review President Trump's tax returns, urging chairman Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) to request documents from the U.S. Treasury that would shed light on his financials and any conflicts of interest.

Trump refuses to release his tax returns, claiming he is under audit and has been told not to share any forms. Democrats say that those documents could show if Trump's business dealings pose any conflicts of interest, and lawmakers should be able to review them and then decide if they can be released to the public, Reuters reports.

On Thursday, Democrats in the House of Representatives plan to send a similar bipartisan letter, signed by 140 Democrats and Republicans, to Hatch and House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady. Hatch and Brady already responded to the letter from the Senate, saying Democrats are asking for something that is an "abuse of the tax-writing committees' statutory authority," and it would set "a dangerous precedent."

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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

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