Dem rep jabs Trump with haiku about his taxes

Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) marked National Haiku Poetry Day on Monday by tweeting a haiku criticizing President Trump’s refusal to release his tax returns.

President Trump claims
“Nothing to hide, or to fear.”
Still, no tax returns.#NationalHaikuPoetryDay #TaxDay

— Rep. Eric Swalwell (@RepSwalwell) April 17, 2017

Monday is National Haiku Poetry Day, an annual event celebrating the Japanese poetry style traditionally composed of three lines.

Haikus are typically non-rhyming and consist of five syllables in the first line, seven in the second and five in the third.

Swalwell, 36, has risen in prominence lately as a high-profile Trump critic, in part thanks to his position on the House Intelligence Committee.

{mosads}White House press secretary Sean Spicer said Monday that Trump’s 2016 tax returns are under audit and will not be released.

“The president is under audit, it’s a routine one, it continues, and I think the American public knows clearly where he stands,” he said.

“This was something he made very clear during the election cycle,” Spicer added, citing a decades-old rule that automatically places the president’s returns under audit. “We are under the same audit that existed, so nothing has changed.”

Thousands of people turned out at rallies across the country Saturday demanding that Trump make his tax filings public. 

Trump bucked decades of precedent by refusing to release his tax returns during last year’s presidential campaign.

The IRS has stated that an individual can release their tax returns even if they are under audit.