Editorials of The Times: What is Donald Trump hiding?

Trump promised to release his tax returns before his presidential campaign and in the early stages of that campaign, then reneged, offering a long series of inconsistent excuses for breaking his promise. Now Trump is resisting the lawful request of the House Ways and Means Committee for the Treasury secretary to release the last six years of his tax returns.

In seeking the president’s returns, the House is clearly acting in the public interest.

First and foremost, the public deserves to know more about Trump’s finances: from whom he has borrowed, with whom he has done business, to whom he may be beholden. This is relevant information about any president, but it is particularly important in the case of Trump, because he refused to divest his business holdings following his election, breaking with the practice of his predecessors.

Trump has provided some information, including in the annual financial disclosures he filed as a candidate and as president. But his tax returns would provide a fuller record, including previous investments and obligations.

A tax return is far from a complete picture of a person’s financial life. For one thing, it is an accounting of income rather than wealth, so it would not establish whether Trump is a billionaire. But Trump’s tax returns could provide significant information about matters of greater public import, including his debts and the sources of his income. For example, if Trump deducted the interest payments on a loan from his taxable income, he would be required to disclose information about the source and amount of that loan. Another example: A partnership that sells real estate, and includes foreign partners, must disclose information about those partners.

If Trump holds money in foreign tax havens, those investments would be listed, too.

The disclosure of Trump’s tax returns could also help to verify, or falsify, a range of assertions that Trump has made about his own life — stories that he used to build support for his candidacy and continues to use to build support for his policies.

One straightforward fact-check: Trump repeatedly said he would not benefit from the tax cuts passed by Congress in 2017. He said that he would be a “big loser” and that the plan “is going to cost me a fortune.” The claim is absurd on its face. Virtually every major analysis of the tax cut has shown that wealthy people like Trump are the primary beneficiaries. But despite Trump’s best efforts, facts remain stubborn things with special power, and the release of his tax returns would allow a precise calculation of just how much money the president put into his own pocket.

Reporting on Trump’s financial past by Times reporters, including David Barstow, Susanne Craig and Russ Buettner, has already undermined the president’s confected image as a hugely successful businessman. In a piece published Tuesday evening, Craig and Buettner reported Trump “appears to have lost more money than nearly any other individual American taxpayer” year after year in the late 1980s and the early 1990s. Trump has long said he suffered setbacks during the recession in the early 1990s, and then bounced back to rebuild his fortunes. But tax records and other sources show Trump lost big during the boom years of the late 1980s.

Far less is known about Trump’s more recent financial dealings. His federal disclosures provide estimates of revenue rather than profits: In 2017, for example, Trump reported that his Irish golf business had revenues of $14 million, while a separate report to Irish regulators said the business lost about $2 million. For most of Trump’s ventures, there is no public account of the bottom line.

The tax returns could also be used to verify the accuracy of the financial disclosures, or at least to check whether Trump’s returns are consistent with those disclosures.

Trump, for example, omitted from his 2017 disclosure his obligation to repay Michael Cohen for the $130,000 payment Cohen made on his behalf to the pornographic film actress Stormy Daniels. That was before The Wall Street Journal first reported the debt. The following year, Trump reported on his disclosure that he had repaid Cohen.

And the returns could shed light on some mysteries. In the decade before he became president, Trump went on a $400 million shopping spree, paying cash for real estate around the world — a binge first reported by The Washington Post. It was a marked break from Trump’s long-standing habit of using other people’s money, and it remains unclear where Trump got the money, and why he decided to spend it.

The returns also could help to clarify whether Trump continues to cheat on his taxes. The Times has previously reported that Trump engaged in fraud to avoid taxation during the 1990s. In requesting Trump’s tax returns, the House has said it seeks to evaluate whether he is being properly audited by the Internal Revenue Service, which audits all presidential returns as a matter of policy. It has asked for the last six years of the president’s personal tax returns — the period likely still subject to an IRS audit — and tax information for eight of Trump’s businesses.

The congressional effort to obtain Trump’s returns is a second-best solution. The House committee would be able to evaluate the information, but not to share the returns with the public. Similarly, a bill passed by the New York state Senate on Wednesday would allow New York to release Trump’s state tax returns to select congressional committees, but not to the public.

The best answer remains for Trump to keep his promise and release his returns voluntarily. But unless and until he does so, Congress can and must force the issue.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.