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Former United States President Donald Trump has lodged a legal challenge to a Justice Department (DOJ) order that his long-sought tax returns be turned over to a House of Representatives committee. In a filing in federal court in the District of Columbia on Wednesday, Trump’s lawyers said the House Ways and Means Committee lacks a legitimate basis for seeking his federal tax returns, and that the Justice Department erred when it backed the committee’s request.... The Democratic-led Ways and Means Committee has said it wants the tax data to determine whether the IRS is properly auditing presidential tax returns in...

Secretary Kathleen Sebelius testified on the Health and Human Services Department fiscal year 2015 budget request.

Charlie Rangel yesterday was granted a face-saving "leave of absence" as House Ways and Means Committee chairman, pending the outcome of multiple ethics investigations. A "leave of absence"? He should be in handcuffs. Consider where you'd stand with the IRS and the FBI if you: * Failed to report and pay taxes on rental income from a Dominican villa (as The Post first revealed two years ago). * Failed to report on millions of dollars in assets, bank accounts and property, going back seven years. * Used congressional stationery to seek donations for a CUNY educational center named after you.

WASHINGTON -- Embattled Harlem Rep. Charles Rangel will likely give up his chairmanship of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee after he began hemorrhaging support from fellow Democrats, sources said last night. Rangel, who is under investigation by the House Ethics Committee, was believed to be brokering a deal to temporarily give up the reins of the tax-writing committee ahead of a vote this week to strip him of the chairmanship, sources said. Five days after the House ethics panel admonished Rangel for breaking House gift-ban rules by taking corporate-sponsored Caribbean junkets in 2007 and 2008, calls for him...

YEAH! Rangel takes his money and runs, resigning this very evening his chairmanship of the House Ways and Means Committee. Maybe now he'll learn to do his taxes properly. According to Democratic officials, New York Congressman Charlie Rangel is set to temporarily step down from his chairmanship of the House Ways and Means committee.

WASHINGTON -- Rep. Charles Rangel has long been the butt of jokes for late-night comics and innocent taxpayers everywhere. Now, the Harlem Democrat is about to find himself starring in a new role -- one that could put nervous Democrats from around the country on the record about whether or not they back the powerful pol as he's being probed by the House Ethics Committee.

"If we were not so used to it, we would find it odd for the government to collect money from young workers and give it to the old (mostly workers' parents)." -- Robert Barro The headline that Business Week put on Robert Barro's column quoted above was "Why Private Accounts are Bad Public Policy." And the headline that the Washington Post put on a story that referred to Barro and others was Conservatives Splitting on Social Security. Is that the real story? I would describe Social Security as a program with a dubious economic rationale and very large costs. As...

January 9, 2003 First Black Woman on Ways and Means After GOP Backtracks House Republicans voted Wednesday to reduce the size of the Ways and Means Committee. Six hours later, they reversed the decision, thus denying Democrats the opportunity to accuse them of costing a black congresswoman a seat on the exclusive panel. The drama began unfolding around 1 p.m., when the Republican Steering Committee approved a request by Ways and Means Committee Chairman Bill Thomas, R-Calif., to reduce the size of his panel by eliminating one GOP position and one Democratic slot. Before that word reached Democrats, the minority...