Trump tax bill would have been slashed by his tax proposals

WASHINGTON — Donald Trump campaigned for the presidency by pledging no tax cuts for the wealthy, but newly leaked pages from his 2005 taxes demonstrate how the wealthiest Americans — like Trump — would benefit from some of his tax proposals.

Trump’s proposals to eliminate the alternative minimum tax, cut the capital gains tax rate and curb income tax rates would have shrunk his tax bill dramatically if they had been in place over a decade ago. The AMT alone was responsible for roughly 86 percent of his federal tax bill.

The Trump administration has said it would make up for lost revenue by closing loopholes, but the specific deductions Trump’s plan would eliminate have not been laid out in detail.

Trump’s promise to not slash taxes for the rich has already been called into question by the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center and other analysts.

According to the group, the top 1 percent of earners would receive a tax break averaging more than $200,000 each. Those gains would be concentrated among the wealthiest: The top 0.1 percent would receive tax breaks averaging around $1.1 million. Meanwhile, middleincome households would receive $1,010 in tax cuts, and the lowest-income earners would receive a benefit of $110.

The summary of Trump’s 2005 taxes does not provide a full picture of Trump’s finances, the deductions he claimed and the detail of his income earned. Still, the numbers in broad strokes illustrate why his tax plan would be a boon for the ultrawealthy.

Trump made nearly $1 million in wages and another $32 million in capital gains, according to the two pages obtained by journalist David Cay Johnston. Most of his earnings came from business income, rental real estate, royalties and partnerships. Trump offset much of that income through a tax loophole in the 1990s that enabled him to deduct more than $900 million in past losses on his casinos.