Nicholas Shaxson: "Snakes On a Campaign" The Real Reason Trump Won't Release His Taxes
As you probably are aware, Shaxson, in his book Treasure Islands: The Men Who Stole The World, was the first to bust out the world of offshore taxation as the primary cause of weakening state economies across the planet.
So I read everything he writes these days. He's never boring.
No, he doesn't break out Trump's IRS tax forms here, but he does show Sleazy Donald's FEC filing highlights (filed only to clarify conflicts of interest), some of his accounting tricks, licensing stance, real estate tax strategies, his tax deductions for "conservation easements" across at least six golf course and estate properties, and his eschewing of offshore tax havens, though his DJ AerospaceLimited has been set up in Bermuda for 22 years.
Shaxson builds the possibility that the best accounting lawyers could prove FEC filing fraud.
Could the non-U.S. rights to Trumps very name be owned by an offshore tax-haven company? If so, as Kleinbard explained to me, the royalties might flow from a Donaldco in Delaware to a company higher up the corporate tree in the Netherlands, then further up to an Irish corporation resident in Bermuda (dont ask), where they would ultimately be parked offshore as stateless income, incurring no tax.
This might be Romneys bombshell.
Citing the Doonbeg example, where the accounts show a loss but Trump reported a $10.7 million profit to the F.E.C., he says, If it was still losing money and he put it down to show that it was more successful than it was, and he reported $10 million of phantom income, and he did it deliberatelythat is a federal offense, and that would be very serious if he did it.
http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2016/06/the-great-trump-tax-mysteries
1StrongBlackMan
(31,849 posts)Judi Lynn
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