Pelosi Introduces Bill to Force Presidents—But Not Members of Congress—to Release Their Tax Returns

Cybercast News Service ^ | January 6, 2019 | 9:49 AM EST | CNSNews.com Staff

[Olog-hai]

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi introduced legislation on Friday that would require the president and vice president and candidates for the presidency and vice presidency to release their tax returns.

The bill, however, would not require members of Congress or candidates for Congress to release their tax returns.

The provision is part of H.R. 1—the “For the People Act”—which Pelosi introduced Friday. A summary of the bill says that it includes a section titled “Presidential Tax Transparency.” […]

In 2017, when members of Congress were calling on President Donald Trump to release his tax returns, Roll Call asked all 535 members of the House and Senate to release theirs. As Roll Call reported at the time, 6 members did release their tax returns as requested by the publication. Another 6 had already released theirs elsewhere. Another 45 members, Roll Call reported, had previously and partially released their tax returns. But 473 members had not released their tax returns and did not respond to Roll Call’s request that they do so.

Rep. Nancy Pelosi was one of the members, Roll Call reported, who had not released her tax returns. …

[SweetWilliamsMom]

I’m neither a lawyer nor a paralegal, but I’m pretty sure this proposal is unconstitutional and the Supreme Court has already ruled on a couple of very similar cases. In 1969 there was a case involving Adam Clayton Powell. (Powell v McCormack). Among other things the Court held that “In judging the qualifications of its members under Art. I, § 5, Congress is limited to the standing qualifications expressly prescribed by the Constitution. P. 395 U. S. 550.” In other words Congress can’t add new qualifications.

Better than that, however, is the more recent case (argued 1994, opinion in 1995) involving a petition from the people in Arkansas trying to impose term limits on its congressmen and senators. The case was U.S. Term Limits, Inc. v Thornton. Here are part of the words read by Justice Stephens when he delivered the majority opinion in that case:

“Over 25 years ago in a case called Powell v. McCormack we concluded that the qualification set forth in the text of the Constitution were exclusive at least in the sense that Congress may not supplement. Today’s cases present a different question than that presented in Powell, because the Arkansas Amendment was passed by a State rather than Congress.We are convinced however that the States as well as the Congress lack the power to add to the qualification set forth in the text of the Constitution.”

There’s an article dated May 23, 1995 in the NY Times about this case. The headline was “High Court Blocks Term Limits for Congress in 5-4 Decision.” I think anyone can get this article just by googling it.

I think it would be pretty hard to argue that forcing people running for office to provide a copy of their tax returns was not an attempt to amend the qualifications for running.