New York prosecutors blast DOJ filing in lawsuit over tax return subpoena

The Manhattan district attorney’s office on Thursday blasted the Department of Justice (DOJ) for siding with President Trump in a lawsuit over a subpoena for the president’s tax returns.

The DOJ on Wednesday filed a court document that agreed with Trump that the lawsuit belongs in federal court. The DOJ also called for enforcement of the subpoena to be temporarily blocked if necessary while the court considers Trump’s constitutional claims. 

But the district attorney’s office said in its new filing that DOJ’s document “ignores the reality” underlying Trump’s lawsuit.{mosads}

“In short, the Plaintiffs only goal in this litigation, now supported by the DOJ itself, is to obtain as much delay as possible, through litigation, stays, and appeals,” prosecutors with the district attorney’s office wrote. 

The district attorney’s office in late August issued a subpoena to Trump’s accounting firm for the president’s personal and business tax returns and financial records. The subpoena is part of a grand jury investigation into payments made ahead of the 2016 presidential election to women who claim they had affairs with Trump. 

In September, Trump’s personal lawyers filed a lawsuit against Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. (D) and the president’s accounting firm, Mazars USA, in an effort to block the subpoena. The DOJ weighed in Wednesday.

In its filing on Thursday, the district attorney’s office argued that it could be harmed by delaying enforcement of the subpoena because any postponement “will likely result in the expiration of the statutes of limitation that would apply to some of the transactions at issue in the grand jury investigation.”

The district attorney’s office also took issue with the DOJ’s argument that Trump should receive interim relief to prevent him from being irreparably harmed. The New York prosecutors argued that Trump wouldn’t be harmed if asked to comply with the subpoena, because there’s no risk that his tax returns would be published under grand jury secrecy rules and because there’s isn’t anything “sacrosanct” about a president’s tax returns. 

The district attorney’s office also disputed the DOJ’s arguments that the case belongs in federal court. The New York prosecutors reiterated that they think the case should be dismissed and that a legal challenge to their subpoena should be brought in state court.

Trump’s personal lawyers argue in the president’s lawsuit that Trump can’t be criminally investigated while in office. The DOJ didn’t say in its filing Wednesday whether it agreed with that position. 

However, the district attorney’s office argued that through its filing, the DOJ “has elected to insert itself into this private lawsuit to support the Plaintiffs extravagant claim that, given his current position, he and all of his prior business associates and related companies are immune, not just from prosecution, but from any routine grand jury inquiry into transactions undertaken before he was a government employee.”

The district attorney’s office pointed out that federal prosecutors in New York conducted a grand jury investigation into some of the same transactions that are reportedly at issue in the state prosecutors’ investigation.

Under an arrangement reached last week, the district attorney’s office won’t enforce the subpoena until either 1 p.m. two business days after a judge’s ruling or 1 p.m. on Oct. 7, whichever comes first. The judge hearing the case is Victor Marrero, a judge in federal court in New York appointed by former President Clinton.