Presidential Tax Returns

No law requires a President or presidential candidate to release tax returns. The tradition began after reports in 1973 that Richard Nixon had paid very little income tax, when he released his returns and later paid back taxes. From 1976 to 2012 every major-party nominee released at least some returns, and every President released returns while in office. Since 1977 the IRS has had a policy of automatically auditing the returns of the sitting President and Vice President each year.

The 2016 Republican nominee declined to release his returns, citing an ongoing audit, and continued to decline as President. In 2020 the Supreme Court decided two cases: in Trump v. Vance it held 7 to 2 that a sitting President has no absolute immunity from a state grand jury subpoena for his financial records, and in Trump v. Mazars it set standards for congressional subpoenas of a President's records. Under a 1924 law allowing the House Ways and Means Committee to obtain any taxpayer's returns, the committee obtained six years of returns after the Supreme Court declined to intervene in November 2022, and released them on December 30, 2022, along with a report finding that the IRS had not promptly audited them as its policy required.

California passed a law in 2019 requiring presidential primary candidates to release their returns to appear on the ballot, but the state supreme court struck it down that November. Bills in Congress to require disclosure have not passed. Supporters of mandatory release say returns reveal conflicts of interest and foreign entanglements that financial disclosure reports, which list assets only in broad ranges, can miss. Opponents say tax returns are private, that existing disclosure laws are sufficient, and that the qualifications for office are set by the Constitution, not by statutes or states.