In a new court filing, President Donald Trump’s attorneys are seeking to block Elijah Cummings’ subpoena to Mazars USA. | Nicholas Kamm/AFP/Getty Images legal Trump sues to block House subpoena of financial records Elijah Cummings wants records from accounting firm Mazars USA as part of an investigation into Trump's business empire.

President Donald Trump on Monday filed a lawsuit against House Oversight and Reform Committee Chairman Elijah Cummings to block a subpoena of the president's financial records from an accounting firm, escalating tensions between the White House and congressional Democrats who are investigating his business empire.

In a new court filing, Trump’s attorneys asked for an order to block Cummings’ subpoena to Mazars USA. The Democratic lawmaker is attempting to obtain eight years of the president’s financial records from Mazars, which had asked the committee for a so-called friendly subpoena so that it could comply with the request.


“We will not allow congressional presidential harassment to go unanswered,” Trump attorney Jay Sekulow said in a statement Monday.

The committee is investigating allegations from Trump’s former attorney and fixer Michael Cohen that the president at times artificially inflated and deflated his assets for his personal benefit. Cummings requested similar documents last month from financial giant Capital One, which also asked for a friendly subpoena.

Republicans have contended that the investigation is intended to embarrass Trump, and they said the subpoena to Mazars — which Cummings formally issued last week — amounts to an abuse of power. The White House has refused to comply with various congressional demands for documents and witness testimony on a host of subjects including Trump’s tax returns and the White House security clearance process.

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Trump's filing on Monday morning in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia reams Democrats for their myriad investigations targeting Trump, his presidential campaign and his business empire. The filing comes a week after attorneys William Consovoy and Stefan Passantino threatened legal action against Mazars’ outside counsel if the company complied with the subpoena.

“Instead of working with the president to pass bipartisan legislation that would actually benefit Americans, House Democrats are singularly obsessed with finding something they can use to damage the president politically,” the filing states.

The filing also says Democrats are seeking to disclose Trump’s “private financial information for the sake of exposure, with the hope that it will turn up something that Democrats can use as a political tool against the president now and in the 2020 election.”

In a statement later Monday, Cummings dismissed Trump’s lawsuit as an attempt to sidestep legitimate congressional oversight.

The House Oversight and Reform Committee, led by Rep. Elijah Cummings, is investigating allegations that the president artificially inflated and deflated his assets for his personal benefit. | Alex Wong/Getty Images

“The president has a long history of trying to use baseless lawsuits to attack his adversaries, but there is simply no valid legal basis to interfere with this duly authorized subpoena from Congress,” Cummings said. “This complaint reads more like political talking points than a reasoned legal brief, and it contains a litany of inaccurate information. The White House is engaged in unprecedented stonewalling on all fronts, and they have refused to produce a single document or witness to the Oversight Committee during this entire year.”

After initially remaining largely silent as Democrats ramped up their various investigations, the president’s attorneys have gone on the offensive in recent weeks.

“The committee’s attempt to obtain years’ worth of confidential information from their accountants lacks any legitimate legislative purpose, is an abuse of power, and is just another example of overreach by the president’s political opponents. We look forward to vindicating our clients’ rights in this matter,” Consovoy and Passantino said in a statement.

When he testified to the Oversight panel in February, Cohen provided copies of Trump’s financial statements, which Cohen said were sent to Deutsche Bank in 2014 to seek a loan to buy the Buffalo Bills football team. Cohen said Trump inflated the value of his assets at the time to secure a loan as part of an unsuccessful bid to purchase the team.

Trump’s suit against Cummings was assigned to U.S. District Court Judge Amit Mehta, an appointee of President Barack Obama. Later Monday, Trump’s attorneys filed a preliminary injunction asking Mehta to issue a ruling by next Monday at noon, because “Mazars might comply with the subpoena” by then.

Josh Gerstein contributed to this story.



CORRECTION: A previous version of this story misstated in paragraph 2 how many years' worth of financial records the committee is seeking. It is eight years' worth.