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What a joke. Maddow is a fucking moron and whoever released his info should go to jail. But as we all know nobody will ever be prosecuted.
As it turns out..........nothing. That tax return was made public over a year ago. Poor Rachael just can't win.
Ishmael
What a joke. Maddow is a fucking moron and whoever released his info should go to jail. But as we all know nobody will ever be prosecuted.
What Maddow and the fine folks over at MSNBC actually managed to do was get part of a copy of Trump’s 2005 tax return. Which was already 12 years old. And which the White House had already released.
And which the Wall Street Journal had already reported on – a year ago.
While these observations certainly provide insights into how the super-rich like Trump avoid paying their fair share in taxes, they were hardly original insights and did not shed any light on the potential conflicts of interest that observers (Maddow included) have speculated could explain why the president refuses to disclose them. This has caused many to criticize Maddow’s scoop as much ado about nothing, from Willa Paskin of Slate describing it as “a cautionary tale about over-hype” and Derek Hawkins of The Washington Post speculating that “Trump seemed to make it through the segment in pretty good shape — so good that a cyberspace chorus wondered for hours after the fact: Did Trump leak his own tax return?”
That latter theory was shared by David Cay Johnston, the Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter who provided Maddow with the documents. “It’s entirely possible that Donald sent this to me. It’s a possibility, and it could have been leaked by someone in his direction,” Johnston stated. The fact that the 1040 was labeled “Client Copy” has been cited as lending credence to this hypothesis.
Is there a law forbidding releasing your taxes? I want to see his 2015 taxes with his business ties to Russia and China.
26 U.S. Code § 7213, it also forbids the solicitation of information for material reward.
An IRS tax lawyer tried to explain the law but failed. Its a felony for anyone to make public IRS tax records. But he ignored the realm of the law. Lets sway an army cook steals a case of steaks and gives them to you. You become an accessory after the fact to grand theft. But if the steaks mysteriously appear on your front porch youre not culpable to theft. But you gotta g ive the steaks back, just like you cant keep money put in your checkin g account by error. Racel shoulda put the forms in an envelope and sent them to Trump.
Wouldn't be the first time Trump stepped on his own balls.
But that appears not to have in any way been involved in this instance. Or at least if we can believe reporter Johnston.
Here's a link to the text of the law, on returns it pretty clear:
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/7213
It shall be unlawful for any person to whom any return or return information (as defined in section 6103(b)) is disclosed in a manner unauthorized by this title thereafter willfully to print or publish in any manner not provided by law any such return or return information.
It seems to me the assertion this is protected by the First Amendment is weak. It doesn't make sense that all that's needed to defeat the design our military is to leak Top Secret information to a friendly NYTs reporter who then informs the enemy by publishing it. According to Judge Napolitano the gov't regards the security of tax returns to be right up there with Top Secret information. Curious situation.
Got you to watch the show for the first time.Looks like Madcow stepped on her own balls this time.
As I posted in another thread:
Even if the document was acquired illegally, Maddow has the First Amendment protection to publish it because, “A stranger’s illegal conduct does not suffice to remove the First Amendment shield from speech about a matter of public concern."
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/15/us/politics/trump-tax-returns-legal-precedent.html?ref=politics&_r=0
When this return was published last year, it was widely rumored that Marla gave it to the press. If true, there's no violation as it's her return too and she can do with it what she pleases.