The Supreme Court agreed on Friday, December 13, to consider an appeal from Donald Trump, who objects to the release of his accounting documents and tax returns to congressional committees and a New York attorney.
The High Court has announced that it will hear the arguments of the parties "During its March 2020 session", for a decision no later than June 30, before the presidential election in November 2020. In the meantime, it has suspended court decisions that forced the billionaire's former accounting firm and two banks to transmit these financial documents.
The High Court’s decision will be closely scrutinized as the Temple of American Law may take the opportunity to rule on the extent of the president’s immunity. Donald Trump claims to have total immunity during his term, and relies on the Supreme Court – in which the Conservative judges are in the majority – to validate this very extensive reading of presidential powers.
Buy the silence of a pornographic actress
The former real estate tycoon, who has made his fortune a campaign argument, is the first American president since Richard Nixon to refuse to disclose his tax situation.
In April, Manhattan attorney Cyrus Vance requested eight years (2011 to 2018) of Mr. Trump's tax returns from his former accounting firm Mazars. He made the request as part of an investigation into a payment to pornographic actress Stormy Daniels to buy his silence on an alleged affair with the billionaire. This payment, made during the 2016 campaign, may have violated election campaign finance laws.
"The witch hunt continues with local New York prosecutors reviewing all the financial transactions I have ever made. Never seen for a president, what they do is not legal ", had stormed the White House tenant in a tweet. "But I am in good standing, and when I publish my financial statement in time for the election, it will only prove one thing – that I am much richer than people thought ", he added.
Federal courts have ruled him wrong
In parallel, committees of the House of Representatives – where the Democrats have been in the majority since January – have asked for a whole series of financial documents covering the same period in injunctions addressed to the Mazars cabinet, but also to the banks Deutsche Bank and Capital One.
The president objected to all three petitions in court, but was denied by the federal courts at first instance and on appeal. He then turned to the United States Supreme Court, which has been fundamentally overhauled since his election. "We are pleased that the Supreme Court has accepted the President's three appeals", commented his personal lawyer Jay Sekulow. "These files raise important constitutional questions and we are waiting to be able to present our arguments", he tweeted again.
"We are confident that the Supreme Court, the highest court in the country, will uphold the Constitution, the decisions of other courts, and ensure that the duty of oversight of Congress can be fulfilled", said Democrats in Congress, Nancy Pelosi, while regretting that Americans must "Now wait several months before the final decision".
Trump’s supporters have already sent arguments to the court asking it to overturn the court’s decisions. "Given the temptation to smear political rivals, intrusive injunctions in the personal lives of presidents will become normal", they warned. They also noted that Cyrus Vance was a New York state attorney and that he could not investigate an acting president. Mr. Vance responded that he was not investigating acts committed by Mr. Trump while in office, and that his injunction was addressed to a third party, not the New York billionaire himself.
