WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump President paid only $750 in federal income taxes the year he won the presidency, according to an investigative report published in an international newspaper.
“Trump taxes show chronic losses and years of tax avoidance,” was the banner headline on the paper’s website. “The president paid $750 in federal income taxes the year he won the presidency”, the paper reported, adding that in his first year in the White House, he paid another $750.
Citing the tax return data, the report claimed that the president had paid no income taxes at all in 10 of the previous 15 years — largely because he reported losing much more money than he made in his businesses.
In all, the paper said, Trump paid no federal income taxes in 11 of 18 years its reporters examined. The publication clarified that the documents it had obtained comprise information that Trump has disclosed to the IRS.
The report further informed that Trump owns hundreds of millions of dollars in valuable assets, but they do not reveal his true wealth. The paper also said it would not publish the documents, in order to protect its source.
“As the president wages a re-election campaign that polls say he is in danger of losing, his finances are under stress, beset by losses and hundreds of millions of dollars in debt coming due that he has personally guaranteed,” the report added.
It further stated, “Also hanging over him is a decade-long audit battle with the Internal Revenue Service over the legitimacy of a $72.9 million tax refund that he claimed, and received, after declaring huge losses. An adverse ruling could cost him more than $100 million.”
Speaking at a news conference at the White House, US president Donald Trump dismissed the report as “fake news” and claimed he has paid taxes, although he gave no further details on the matter.
He said, “Totally fake news, no. Actually I paid tax. And you’ll see that as soon as my tax returns – it’s under audit, they’ve been under audit for a long time. The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) does not treat me well. You have people in the IRS – they treat me very badly.”
However, his lawyer, Garten, in a statement said, “Over the past decade, President Trump has paid tens of millions of dollars in personal taxes to the federal government, including paying millions in personal taxes since announcing his candidacy in 2015.”