President Trump is taking California to court over a new law requiring presidential candidates to release tax returns in order to get on the primary ballot in the state, CNN reports.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) last week signed a law that requires every presidential candidate whose name appears on a primary ballot to release five years of income tax returns, a step clearly taken in response to Trump, who refused to release his tax returns during the 2016 presidential election. Under the law, the candidate's tax returns would be made publicly available online. Seeing as Trump is facing no serious threat in the Republican primary, it wasn't expected to have much of a tangible effect on his re-election campaign, though.
Trump and his campaign on Tuesday filed a lawsuit with the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California, with the suit arguing that California's law "adds an unconstitutional qualification to the fixed set of qualifications for the presidency in the Constitution" and should be blocked by the court. Named in the lawsuit are California Secretary of State Alex Padilla and California Attorney General Xavier Becerra.
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The Republican National Committee also filed a lawsuit against the law on Tuesday, The New York Times reports, with this one referring to the law as a "naked political attack against the sitting president of the United States." Upon signing the bill last week, Newsom said in a statement that "states have a legal and moral duty to do everything in their power to ensure leaders seeking the highest offices meet minimal standards, and to restore public confidence."
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