Jared Polis is right; it is “completely appropriate” for someone who doesn’t have any net income not to pay federal income tax.

But you wouldn’t know that based on the misleading ads that are being run by the Republican Governors Association.

The television ad makes it sound like Polis has used clever accounting tricks, specifically off-shore accounts that shelter money from the IRS, to avoid paying federal income taxes.

The Denver Post’s reporters have never found evidence of such behavior in Polis’ lengthy financial disclosures required by Congress or in the tax documents he voluntarily disclosed when he ran for Congress in 2008.

The Denver Post’s Jon Murray reported that in the four years spanning 2001 to 2005, Polis reported “a net loss of income.” Murray noted that in other years “Polis paid more than $18.4 million in income taxes on more than $120 million in adjusted gross income.”

We are certain that Polis, like all good businessmen, has taken full advantage of the deductions and exemptions in the tax code to help minimize his tax bill, but Polis’ campaign is insistent that he has not personally used an off-shore tax haven.

It’s important to note that the reason we feel comfortable refuting these claims is that Polis took the laudable step in 2008, the year he was first elected to Congress, to make seven years of tax returns available for scrutiny.

That type of transparency and openness is no longer the status quo.

President Donald Trump has been sitting in the White House for almost two years now without disclosing his tax records. He is the first president not to do so in decades.

Tax returns don’t tell voters everything, but they are a good indication of candidates’ charitable giving, income sources, the type of deductions they have claimed, income from investments and other tax avoidance measures.

In 2014, both Gov. John Hickenlooper and his opponent Bob Beauprez released their tax returns ahead of the election – to be specific, Hickenlooper released 27 years of shorter tax summaries and Beauprez released eight years of complete tax records, according to The Denver Post’s analysis of their documents.

That report indicated that during at least one year Hickenlooper’s charitable giving and his deductions for mortgage and investment interest resulted in him paying a very low federal tax rate of 3 percent, and Beauprez’s business losses meant he paid no federal income tax in 2008 and 2009.

We don’t recall any attack ads accusing those businessmen of evading taxes — and that’s because they didn’t.

Releasing tax documents is an important, albeit uncomfortable, step for transparency. It’s a tradition we hope Polis and his opponent Walker Stapleton will continue by releasing at least five years of tax returns before the November election.

Polis also has put his assets in a blind trust while he has served in public office, an important step to avoid the conflicts of interest that can come when working for the public good.

And while we can’t ensure that all of the bad actors out there running unaccountable third-party ad campaigns will do the responsible thing with the information in tax returns, we know the fair reporting conducted by the mainstream media will include the context necessary to inform voters about the finances of Colorado’s potential next governor.

CORRECTION: This file was updated at 9:30 a.m. on Sep. 1, 2018, to correct an editor’s error. Walker Stapleton also has put his assets into a blind trust.

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