Vow to pursue leaker of tax files

Michael Bloomberg vowed to use ‘‘all legal means’’ to pursue whoever leaked the tax returns of the 25 richest Americans. The disclosure has revived a campaign by left-wing Democrats for a levy on wealth rather than just income.

Bloomberg, a billionaire media mogul, paid no income tax in at least one recent year, according to Propublica, the independent journalism group that published selective records of the super-wealthy, including the Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, the investor and philanthropist George Soros and the Tesla founder Elon Musk.

Propublica said that it had obtained ‘‘a massive trove of tax information covering thousands of America’s wealthiest individuals’’ and defended on public interest grounds its illegal move to release them.

No unlawful activity was suggested but the group said the data showed how the super-rich can ‘‘exploit the structure of our tax code to avoid the tax burdens borne by ordinary citizens’’.

The group conceded that the information could have been stolen by a hostile power amid warnings that the leaker’s motivation could be to sow social discord in America at a time of intense polarisation.

Propublica’s claim that the wealthiest 25 individuals paid an average income tax rate of 15.8 per cent comes at a time when President Joe Biden is seeking to close loopholes and raise taxes on businesses and investments to fund his ambitious infrastructure proposals. Moderate Republicans negotiating with Democrats in the Senate on the reforms ruled out higher taxes yesterday. ‘‘We’re not raising taxes,’’ said Mitt Romney, a Republican senator from Utah.

The tax data showed that the richest Americans were able to increase their wealth hugely while declaring little or no taxable income. The investor and philanthropist Warren Buffett, 90, saw his wealth rise by US$24.3 billion (NZ$34 billion) from 2014 to 2018 but he paid US$23.7 million in tax, a rate of 0.1 per cent.

‘‘Our tax system is rigged for billionaires who don’t make their fortunes through income, like working families do,’’ tweeted Elizabeth Warren, a senator who ran for the Democratic presidential nomination last year. ‘‘It is time for a wealth tax in America to make the ultra-rich finally pay their fair share.’’

A spokesman for Bloomberg said: ‘‘The release of a private citizen’s tax returns should raise real privacy concerns regardless of political affiliation or views on tax policy.

‘‘In the United States no private citizen should fear the illegal release of their taxes. We intend to use all legal means at our disposal to determine which individual or government entity leaked these and ensure that they are held responsible.’’

He said that the sums Bloomberg gave to charity and paid in taxes amounted to about 75 per cent of his income.

Biden is proposing to nearly double the tax rate that highearning Americans pay on profits from stocks and other investments and to tax inherited capital gains. – The Times