Trump Hits Stephanopoulos for Pro-Hillary Bias, Says His Taxes Are ‘None of Your Business’

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• Yeah, it's cool to see the media get dissed, but I suspect the real reason Trump doesn't want the American public to see his tax returns is because they'll see that he's been wildly exaggerating his income and wealth. I'm not the first guy to say he's been exaggerating and THIS GUY saw his tax returns, and income is the first thing on his list of reasons why we all need to see them.

  Trump has made the size of his fortune a centerpiece of his presidential campaign, implying that it’s a measure of his success as a businessman. He has also correctly noted that the income shown on his tax returns isn’t a reflection of his total wealth. Even so, income is a basis for assessing some of the foundations of any individual’s wealth -- and would certainly reflect the financial wherewithal of the businesses in which Trump is involved.

  After Fortune’s Shawn Tully dug into Trump’s financial disclosures with the Federal Election Commission and an accompanying personal balance sheet his campaign released, he noted in March that Trump “appears to have overstated his income, by a lot, which could be the reason he has so far tried to avoid releasing his returns.” Tully said that Trump apparently boosted his income in the documents by conflating his various businesses’ revenue with his personal income. Trump didn’t respond to Tully’s assessment, but he could clear up all of that by releasing his tax returns.

  • Well Trump released his balance sheet (his net worth) weeks after filing. As to his income taxes, that is an income statement and he has said he does everything possible to pay as little taxes as possible. So I would expect to see as low an income and as high as an expenses as possible.

    Deprecation will be a very large expense that is not actually a cash flow event.

    • You apparently cannot comprehend simple English words. From the quoted passage: "...Trump apparently boosted his income in the documents by conflating his various businesses’ revenue with his personal income." That means he was trying to make his income as high as possible, not as low as possible. Which suggests he is ashamed of how little he makes.

      This jibes with what a lot of sources have been saying for years, that he's a pompous loser who inflates his own financial worth. Forbes has been questioning his net worth for decades, not just years. Forbes is just estimating, of course, but they've gotten pretty good at it over the years. Right now they have Trump south of $10 billion whereas Trump claims to be worth north of $20 billion.

      Why is this germane? Isn't a billionaire a billionaire? Well, it goes to competence. Financial people have calculated that if Trump had simply put his inheritance in a mutual fund he would have north of $20 billion now, so if he's actually worth less than $10 billion then he's possibly the worst businessman on Planet Earth, having lost over $10 billion on his various business failures and bankruptcies.

      • If I had inherited what he did, I would have put it in a savings account at .01% and be able to live on the interest, and still have the money grow..

  • I just think it is a shame that no other candidate did this. I think Paul (I'm biased there) and Cruz could and would have been non apologetic and taken the media to task but I guess they couldn't have done it to the same belligerent level that the Donald does. Only Nixon could go to China, only Trump can be a Republican asshole. Unfortunately that is probably the only thing he has going for him.

  • Tax returns deal with income or lack thereof and are not necessarily indicative of net worth. You could extrapolate but in doing so the result would be supposition, not factual.
    As to his worth, how much "blue sky" is too much? In the eyes of the beholders there could be many assessments, none of which would be accurate.