When Richie Neal was mayor of Springfield, in Western Massachusetts, in the 1980s, Donald Trump was a lying Manhattan real estate promoter who routinely cheated those who were foolish enough to do business with him. God knows what Trump’s tax returns looked like, but those suspect documents were a matter only between Trump and the IRS.
Neal is now chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee — Republicans haven’t retaken the House quite yet — and he was fully vindicated Tuesday when the U.S. Supreme Court decided that he has the right to inspect Trump’s returns.
Actually, under the clear language of the law, the chair, along with the Senate Finance Committee chair and Joint Committee on Taxation chair, can see anyone’s federal returns, but Trump has fought Neal’s request for the filings since 2019. And Tuesday, the law prevailed and Trump lost.
