Trump, GOP sue over new California tax returns law
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump and the Republican National Committee filed a pair of lawsuits Tuesday against officials in California, challenging a new law requiring presidential candidates to release five years of tax returns in order to be placed on the state primary ballot in 2020.
The RNC suit, which was filed in the Eastern District of California and included the California Republican Party and several California Republican voters as plaintiffs, called the law a “naked political attack against the sitting president of the United States.” It was filed against Gov. Gavin Newsom and the California secretary of state.
Trump and his campaign filed a second suit challenging the constitutionality of the new law, and it named the California secretary of state and the state attorney general. In that suit, they argue that states do not have the power to “supplement” the qualifications for the president, set forth by the Constitution.
The California law, known as the Presidential Tax Transparency and Accountability Act, was signed by Newsom last week and was the latest flash point between the White House and the state of California, which is involved in more than 40 lawsuits against the Trump administration, on issues including environmental regulation and immigration.
The California Legislature approved a similar measure in 2017, but the governor at the time, Jerry Brown, vetoed it, raising questions about whether it was constitutional.
The suits filed Tuesday claim that the law would suppress the votes of millions of Californians who want to vote for Trump by adding a new requirement for a presidential candidate. The RNC suit asserts that Newsom was creating an “extra-constitutional qualification for the office of president.” The suit argues that Democratic-controlled state legislatures were challenging Trump because they were “enraged” by his 2016 victory, when he did not disclose his federal tax returns.
The two lawsuits followed a complaint filed in Sacramento on Monday by Judicial Watch, a conservative group, on behalf of four California voters, seeking to block the law on constitutional grounds.
“There’s an easy fix for the president,” Newsom said in a statement. “He should release his tax returns as he promised during the campaign and follow the precedent of every president since 1973.”
The vast majority of presidential nominees over decades have released their tax returns, with the exception of President Gerald Ford in 1976. Trump’s decision not to release his tax returns was one of the early traditions he shattered. But Newsom’s attempt to codify the tradition of disclosure into a law has raised serious constitutional issues, according to legal scholars.
“The complaint includes more political rhetoric than is common, but it raises the correct legal issues that certainly pose serious challenges to this law,” said Richard Pildes, a professor of constitutional law at New York University.
In a statement, Ronna McDaniel, chairwoman of the RNC, said that “it certainly doesn’t bode well for Democrats heading into 2020 that their best bet for beating President Trump is to deny millions of Californians the ability to vote for him.”
She called it a “stunt” that was “unconstitutional and, simply put, desperate.”
Jay Sekulow, counsel to Trump and to the campaign, called the campaign’s lawsuit a “decisive action in federal court challenging California’s attempt to circumvent the U.S. Constitution.” He said “the issue of whether the president should release his federal tax returns was litigated in the 2016 election, and the American people spoke.”