Second Circuit Court of Appeals Puts Subpoena on Trump’s Tax Returns on Hold

Second Circuit Court of Appeals Puts Subpoena on Trump’s Tax Returns on Hold

The Second Circuit Court of Appeals put on hold a subpoena issued by a federal that demanded President Donald Trump turn over his tax returns.

Earlier on Monday, U.S. District Court Judge Victor Marrero of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York gave the Manhattan District Attorney’s office to subpoena the returns from Mazars USA, an accounting firm.

Trump lawyer Jay Sekulow said Trump and the team “are very pleased that the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has issued a stay of the subpoena issued by New York County District Attorney Cy Vance.”

Now Vance wants the Second Circuit to fast-track the hearing before Friday.

NEW: Now that the court stayed his subpoena, Manhattan DA Vance wants the Second Circuit to fast-track Trump’s appeal to a hearing before the end of the week.

His proposed schedule is here. pic.twitter.com/uIjwlWPhdE

— Adam Klasfeld (@KlasfeldReports) October 7, 2019

Vance has a probe into the Trump Organization over the supposed hush payments to porn star Stormy Daniels. Trump has denied an affair and a payoff to Daniels.

Trump’s former lawyer Michael Cohen pled guilty to campaign finance violations. He also told Congress that he handed over the money Daniels and Trump knew about it. He claimed Trump and the organization paid him back the money.

Vance opened a new investigation in September over Cohen’s latest allegations. The district attorney wants to know if “the Trump Organization falsely listed its reimbursement of Cohen for the $130,000 payment to Daniels as a legal expense, which would be illegal under New York law.”

Vance wants Trump’s tax returns from January 2011 to the present.

Marrero did not hold back in his ruling:

Marrero, who was appointed by then-President Bill Clinton, wrote that “the expansive notion of constitutional immunity invoked here to shield the President from judicial process would constitute an overreach of executive power,” and that Trump’s argument essentially claims “that a constitutional domain exists in this country in which not only the President, but, derivatively, relatives and persons and business entities associated with him in potentially unlawful private activities, are in fact above the law.”

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Marrero ruled that the federal court should abstain from the matter, as the investigation is part of an ongoing state prosecution. Recognizing that an appellate court may take issue with this decision, Marrero sought to explain at length why he was rejecting Trump’s immunity claim and denying the request for an injunction against the subpoena.

In doing so, he even challenged conventional legal wisdom regarding the high hurdles to presidential prosecution.

The judge said it may be Justice Department policy not to prosecute a sitting president, but stressed that the policy derives from Office of Legal Counsel guidance, not established law.

“[T]he theory has gained a certain degree of axiomatic acceptance, and the DOJ Memos which propagate it have assumed substantial legal force as if their conclusion were inscribed on constitutional tablets so-etched by the Supreme Court,” Marrero wrote. “The Court considers such popular currency for the categorical concept and its legal support as not warranted.”

Mazars USA faced a Monday afternoon deadline to hand over the tax returns.

Federal judge decision in M… by DailyMail.com on Scribd

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