Trump’s lawyers are in talks with the IRS to resolve president’s $10B lawsuit
WASHINGTON (AP) — Lawyers for President Donald Trump are in talks with the IRS to resolve an issue. 10 billion dollar lawsuit President files lawsuit against his own tax collector leaking tax information To news organizations between 2018 and 2020.
In a federal court filing Friday, Trump asked the judge to pause the case for 90 days while the two sides work to reach a settlement or verdict.
“This limited pause will neither harm the parties nor delay the final solution,” the application states. “Rather, the extension will promote judicial economy and allow Parties to explore ways that could narrow down or effectively resolve the issues.”
Tax and ethics experts say the case raises numerous legal and ethical questions, including the appropriateness of the executive branch leader bringing a scorched earth lawsuit against the government he personally controls.
Earlier this year, Trump filed a lawsuit in Florida federal court alleging that previous leaks of his and the Trump Organization’s confidential tax records caused “reputational and financial harm, public embarrassment, unfairly damaged their business reputations, falsely portrayed them, and adversely affected the public reputation of President Trump and the other Plaintiffs.”
The president’s sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump are also among the plaintiffs in the case.
Former IRS contractor in 2024 Charles Edward LittlejohnA Washington, D.C., man who worked for Booz Allen Hamilton, a defense and national security technology firm, was sentenced to five years in prison after pleading guilty to leaking tax information about President Trump and others to two news outlets between 2018 and 2020.
Those publications were not named in the charging documents, but the disclosure and time frame were consistent with reporting on Trump’s tax returns at The New York Times and reports about the taxes of wealthy Americans at the nonprofit investigative journalism organization ProPublica. 2020 New York Times report It found that Trump paid $750 in federal income taxes the year he first entered the White House, and paid no income taxes at all in some years because of the massive reported losses.
Asked in February how he would deal with potential harm from the lawsuit, Trump said, “I think what we’re going to do is do something for charity.”
“We can grow this to a significant amount,” he said at the time. “No one cares because it will go to a lot of good charities.”
Many ethics watchdog groups have filed friend-of-the-court briefs objecting to the president’s case.
The case is “extraordinary because the President controls both sides of the case, raising the possibility of undercover litigation tactics,” and “conflicts of interest create uncertainty about whether the Justice Department will zealously defend public finances as it has against other plaintiffs seeking damages for related events,” watchdog group Democracy Forward said in a February filing.
