Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump again Thursday declined to release his tax returns, telling Fox News Channel's Greta Van Susteren that other than a few in the media, "people don't care about it."
Trump has cited Van Susteren, a lawyer, as saying she would not advise a client to release any returns that are still under audit, as Trump says his returns for the past several years are.
Van Susteren acknowledged that, but put on her "media" hat and asked him about his returns for other years. Every major party presidential candidate for the past 40 years has released his tax returns.
Trump said that not only does no one care, but 2012 GOP nominee Mitt Romney may have made a mistake by bowing to pressure from Democrats to release his taxes.
"If you remember Harry Reid lied about it, he told a dirty lie," Trump said. "And Mitt gave that and after he gave it, they found a little sentence and they made such a big deal. He might have lost the election over that."
Democrats at their convention produced a video in which former Obama administration economic adviser Austan Goolsbee said public records show Trump paid close to zero taxes in 1978, '79, '84, '91 and '92.
Former Democratic Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley told Van Susteren he probably paid less in taxes for several years than Trump, and added that Trump might really be trying to hide the fact he has done business with Russians, something Trump himself has denied.
"Donald Trump has been so blackballed in terms of being able to get loans for his serial bankruptcy businesses … by domestic banks in the United States of America that he has had to go searching abroad, including to oligarchs with close ties with [Russian President Vladimir] Putin," O'Malley said. "Look, there is a reason that people are nervous about this man getting security briefings given his coziness to the Russians."
Democrats have been
hitting Trump over possible Russian ties after he on Tuesday called on Russia during a press conference to find Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton's deleted emails from her personal server. Trump said he was being sarcastic after critics accused him of calling on a foreign government to interfere in U.S. elections.
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