How much did Donald Trump pay in taxes while he was president?
Trump’s tax returns from 2015 to 2020 will be made public. While he did pay taxes for five years, the refund for the fifth saw him regain all paid and more.
The House Ways and Means Committee chaired by Democratic Representative Richard Neal had been fighting to get access to Donald Trump’s tax returns from 2015 to 2020 for three years. After four court rulings upholding Congress’ legal right to review the documents, the final coming from the Supreme Court, the committee finally received six years of the former president’s income filings in November.
The House committee voted along party lines on Tuesday to make the documents public, which every president and candidate for the highest office in the land has done since Nixon except for Trump, and released a report on their findings after inspection.
The businessman and reality TV star that became the leader of the United States paid taxes the first three years as president. However, two of those years he only paid a total of $1,500 and the refund he received in the fourth year more than made up for what he sent to the nation’s coffers.
How much did Donald Trump pay in taxes while he was president?
The author of “The Art of the Deal” often boasted in public of his business acumen, but in the run-up to entering the White House he and Melania filing jointly declared negative income. Only in his second year as president did he go into the black, paying nearly a million dollars that year. In total he paid a little over $1.1 million to the IRS while president. However, he got back nearly $5.5 million from Uncle Sam for his 2020 tax return, giving him a net gain of roughly $4.3 million while holding office.
Trump tax filings for fiscal years 2015 through 2020
| Tax year | Declared income | Taxable income | Federal taxes paid |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | - $31.7 million | $0 | $641,931 |
| 2016 | -$31.2 million | $0 | $750 |
| 2017 | -$12.8 million | $0 | $750 |
| 2018 | $24.4 million | $22.9 million | $999,466 |
| 2019 | $4.44 million | $2.97 million | $133,445 |
| 2020 | $4.69 million | $0 | $0 (Refund: $5.47 million) |
IRS failed to do mandatory audit of Trump’s tax returns
The former president had said that he would release his financial statements to Uncle Sam while on the campaign trail but later backtracked. He claimed that because they were under audit that he was not allowed to release them, something the IRS refuted at the time and Commissioner Charles Rettig confirmed three years later in Congressional testimony.
Presidents, and candidates for the office, have released their tax returns voluntarily since the 1970s. The practice resulted from the revelation of the paltry amount that President Richard Nixon paid after making deductions for donating his presidential papers.
His vice president, Spiro Agnew, was also embroiled in tax a tax scandal that forced him to resign after admitting to tax evasion. This prompted the IRS to include a mandatory audit of the president and veep in its manual since 1977. However, the rule was never codified by Congress and was up to the tax agency’s discretion.
Another report from the Ways and Means Committee revealed that only one mandatory audit was started, but never finished, on former President Trump’s tax returns. And that only came after control of the House switched to Democrats and Rep Neal requested information on the then president’s tax returns. The chair of the panel has recommended that legislation be passed “to require the IRS to conduct mandatory audits while a President is in office and publicly disclose related returns and return information.”