The art of the deal: Five things we learned from Trump’s tax returns
Hours after one of Donald Trump’s closest White House allies, Treasury secretary Steve Mnuchin, formally refused the Democrats’ request for the President’s tax returns late on Monday, the cat was out of the bag.
Trump’s much-sought after tax returns reveal massive losses throughout the eighties and nineties for the self-styled master of the deal, topping more than $1bn, according to the New York Times.
Here’s five things we’ve learned from the document the President didn't want people to see.
1. Trump lost more than $1bn between 1985 to 1994
Over a 10-year period the now-President’s core business interests, including casinos, hotels and apartment buildings, burnt through $1.17bn, the New York Times reports.
During this time, the real estate magnate bought New York’s Plaza Hotel in Central Park for $407m, took over a loss-making shuttle operation from Eastern Airlines for $365m and opened the Trump Taj Mahal Hotel and Casino, which opened in April 1990 weighed down by $800m in debt.
New York's Park Plaza hotel (Source: Getty)
2. For two years straight, he appears to have lost twice that of any other individual taxpayer in the US
The worst years in Trump’s decade in the red were, by some distance, 1990 and 1991 – shortly after the Taj Mahal and Casino opened.
In both, he lost more than $250m, making him the biggest loser of any individual US taxpayer in an annual IRS sampling of high-income earners. Not only this, but both years he lost more than double that of anybody else.
Trump watching the US Open tennis tournament in 1991 – a year in which he lost more than $250m (Source: Getty)
3. He didn’t pay income tax for eight of those years
Under US law, business owners like Trump can use their losses to avoid paying tax on future income. Such was the extent of his financial woes, that Trump was exempted from paying income tax for eight of the 10 years from 1985.
4. The President has denied it
After years of denying the public knowledge of his losses in the period, Trump’s lawyers are now denying their accuracy. The New York Times quoted a lawyer for the president, Charles Harder, as saying the tax information was “highly inaccurate”.
Trump himself took to Twitter this afternoon, in typical ebullient style, to call the New York Times' report a "highly inaccurate fake news hit job".
….you would get it by building, or even buying. You always wanted to show losses for tax purposes….almost all real estate developers did – and often re-negotiate with banks, it was sport. Additionally, the very old information put out is a highly inaccurate Fake News hit job!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 8, 2019
5. Trump was drowning in debt even as he released The Art Of The Deal
Trump’s legendary deal-making tome was released in 1987, the year he bought the Park Plaza hotel, splashed $29m on a 282-foot yacht and lost a total of $42.2m.
The Art Of The Deal, full of Trump's own personal advice to savvy business people, went on to become a best-seller and helped spin his image as a self-made billionaire – a key part of the persona which also won him the presidency years later.
A child reads Trump's best-selling business advice, The Art Of The Deal (Source: Getty)