Trump Campaign leaked those 1995 tax returns

[TheDebbieDee]

To the Times. The response this morning by the Trump surrogates has been too pat, too rehearsed NOT to be anticipated...

Agree or disagree?

[guillaumeb]

1. Many people think avoiding taxes is a positive thing.

Those same people might also fall for the "law and order" meme.

[Schema Thing]

2. Disagree. Your sentence does not match your headline

Their preparedness or lack thereof is irrelevant to how the tax info got in the public eye.


They were undoubtedly asked for comment before publishing - but even if not, they might have been prepared just in case (althoughthe Donald does seem to be mostly reactionary).

[writes3000]

3. Disagree. They were prepared in case it came up but Trump is on defense now.

You never want to be on defense.

[dawg]

4. If he did, then he's an even bigger idiot than I thought.

They make him look like an incompetent loser. His losses were so large they wouldn't even fit into the boxes.

[2naSalit]

6. Well

He's proven many times during this campaign that his sense of proportion is way off... To him, this (to me) appears to be an escape from ridicule and demands made by the opposition, his sense of proportion in this case might be that his colossal loss is a benefit to business - by purposefully avoiding payment of taxes) and, therefore, appropriate to leak in order to improve his standing with his ignorant base. It's the cocaine talking...

[dawg]

9. It makes him look like a failure, which is why I don't think he released it on purpose.

Protecting his image as a big-time success is more important to him than anything. This makes him look weak.

I think his campaign is reeling right now. If we can keep him on the defensive for another week or so, rats will start departing the ship.

[C_U_L8R]

5. If they did...

then it's only to obfuscate and detract from even worse filings.
Who know's if they're stupid enough to dig in that deep.

[Democat]

7. There would be no reason other than to get it out before it leaked

They would much rather have kept this hidden.

They may have leaked it because they knew it was coming anyways, but that is just playing defense in a bad situation.

[NoGoodNamesLeft]

8. Distracting from Alicia Machado

If they leaked it that would be why.

[geek tragedy]

10. no, they're just screwed nt

[Grammy23]

11. How about they know how screwed up he is and are trying to save all of us?? nt

[onecaliberal]

12. If he did they're even more dumb than I previously believed.

He lost 1 billion dollars in a booming real estate market, while he is telling everyone he's a great businessman. Turns out he's a complete failure and hasn't contributed to the success of America for a generation. Not to mention the money he ripped off of the small businesses he refused to pay.

[CincyDem]

13. Nope. Today's news isn't news to the campaign.

Given the amount of work put into the story, I suspect that the Trump campaign knew they were working on this story for several days. While the story "broke" to the public last night, it probably broke to the campaign Friday sometime ???

More than enough time for Kellyanne and that other guy to get the surrogate stories lined up.

[Blue Idaho]

14. No, for one simple reason.

They are busy spinning the Bill Clinton indiscretions story and they are incapable of walking and chewing gum at the same time.

[karynnj]

15. Disagree

It completely brings up the fact that his business acumen is not as good as they claim. It shows that his hotel and casino business was far less successful than we likely ever thought. His current wealth ironically seems built on untaxed income from selling his "brand" and reality TV -- as much as anything real.

In the past, and even with Guilini today, the argument has been made that the skills that enabled Trump to become fabulously wealthy could be applied to turning the economy around for the US. (Forget that Obama already did turn the economy, which was going straight down in 2008, around. ) The fact is that we can't just sell off the non performing states and restructure our debt through dept forgiveness like Trump did.

[LiberalFighter]

16. They were rehearsed because the NYT had asked Trump about them before going to press.

That gave the campaign time to respond.

[Coyotl]

17. Ridiculous. Nuke your own campaign? They may be stupid, but not that stupid.

Absurd, crazy foolish, goofy illogical, irrational laughable, ludicrous nonsensical, preposterous silly, unreasonable wacky, loony tomfooldery, batty daffy, dippy flaky, fooling around for grins, freaky inane, incongruous, jokey joshing, nutty off the wall, and perhaps a little sappy.

[UCmeNdc]

18. Ask them if this is good, Why not release all of the Tax records?

1995 was a long time ago. How about being a little more transparent?