Stop assuming voters won't care about Trump's taxes

This bombshell could very well change the course of the election. Don't dismiss it.

President Trump.
(Image credit: Illustrated | Getty Images, iStock)

The New York Times released a blockbuster report this week about the information contained in the tax records President Donald Trump has long tried to keep hidden from the public. It will be tempting for pundits and reporters to demonstrate their savvy by arguing that this development doesn't really tell us anything new about Trump, and that voters won't care anyway. But this would be wrong. The story is a big deal. It may well change the course of the election, and assuming voters don't care about the most powerful man in the world being corrupt, self-dealing, and incompetent can become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

The idea that nothing in the returns could be damaging to Trump given what we know already has one obvious flaw: If there was no important negative information in them, why was he the first major party candidate since Richard Nixon not to release his tax returns, and why has he invested an enormous amount of time and money to keep anyone from seeing them once he was elected? Indeed, the Times story is incredibly damning.

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Scott Lemieux

Scott Lemieux is a professor of political science at the College of Saint Rose in Albany, N.Y., with a focus on the Supreme Court and constitutional law. He is a frequent contributor to the American Prospect and blogs for Lawyers, Guns and Money.