Nothing but a fig leaf

Thanks to Donald Trump’s ongoing refusal to come clean financially, rendering to the IRS this year feels particularly irritating. All we got from Trump was a leaked two-page summary of his 2005 return—the year his immigrant wife’s status would have been specially scrutinized—and a lame separation from his business interests through a revocable trust, with sons and longtime CFO installed as trustees.

A revocable trust can be changed or eliminated on a whim. If you or I had a trust like that, and say we needed Medicaid to pay for nursing-home care, we would be disqualified. The trust money would be treated as our own.

This is especially so with Trump, given his subordinate trustees, his virtually unlimited access to income and principal, and trustee power to sell assets and deposit proceeds into Trump’s pocket without disclosure.

The trust is a “sham” and a “fig leaf,” says the Wallace Global Fund, a client of the law firm that devised it. The fund fired that firm, objecting that it had violated “values of open and accountable democratic governance.”

With Trump fancy-dancing like that, we should see his tax returns at the very least. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) notes that they can show “intimate connections” to foreign governments, or answer integrity questions like if you are the person giving to charity or are converting another donor’s gift into your own.

Even before Trump was elected, bipartisan legislation was pending to force candidates’ release of tax returns. Force should not be necessary. With this guy, it is.

ANITA SCHNEE

Fayetteville