Trump’s personal returns will likely be easier to digest than his business ones, which could be exceedingly complicated. | Win McNamee/Getty Images Congress Democrats’ demand for Trump’s tax returns expected in about 2 weeks

House Democrats plan to formally demand President Donald Trump’s tax returns in about two weeks, a key lawmaker said Tuesday.

They intend to seek his personal tax returns covering a decade, but will not at this time request his business filings, said Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-N.J.), a senior member of the House Ways and Means Committee.


“We’re almost ready to go,” said Pascrell, who’s led a push among lawmakers to use an arcane law to unmask Trump’s tax returns.

A 1924 law allows the heads of Congress’ tax committees to examine anyone’s confidential tax filings. Lawmakers can also vote to make those returns publicly available, experts say.

“The chairman will be ready in two weeks to send his letter,” Pascrell said. “And I volunteered to deliver it.”

A spokesman for Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal (D-Mass.) did not respond to requests for comment.

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The effort appears to have ramped up in the wake of testimony last week by Trump’s former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, as well as by the possibility that special counsel Robert Mueller’s long-anticipated report might soon be released.

Cohen told lawmakers last week that Trump has refused to release his returns because he fears public scrutiny will subject him to "taxable consequences." Trump himself also once expressed surprise after receiving a $10 million tax refund from the IRS, Cohen testified.

"He said that he could not believe how stupid the government was for giving 'someone like him' that much money back," said Cohen.

Trump’s personal returns likely will be easier to digest than his business ones would be as his business dealines are exceedingly complicated. The business filings would reveal more about his finances though, and some lawmakers are still pushing Neal to seek those as well.

“Because of the intermingling of Trump’s personal business with the public business, it makes it all the more important to get his business returns,” said Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas), another top tax writer.

“Don’t limit this to individual returns — they will not provide the answers to most of the questions we have,” he said.

A Treasury Department spokesperson said that Secretary Steven Mnuchin will review the legality of any request for Trump’s returns with Treasury attorneys.

Trump has defied a decades-old tradition of presidents who have voluntarily released their returns, and lawmakers hope his filings will answer a long list of questions about his finances. Among them: potential conflicts of interest; how he benefited from the recent tax overhaul; if he’s been under audit as he has long claimed; and how well the IRS has vetted his taxes.

“The tax returns are the key to finding out what this guy is all about,” Pascrell said.

Trump’s returns are unlikely to be released anytime soon, even once Democrats make their request. The administration has promised a legal fight, and Trump has an incentive to stall, perhaps in hopes of his party winning back the House in 2020.

The timing of such a demand has been tricky for Neal.

He’s been pushing a go-slow approach, saying Democrats needed to build a careful legal case. Neal also knows that going to war with the administration over the returns risks any chance of finding agreement on all sorts of legislation, no small consideration when he has been head of the panel only for a few months.

At the same time, though, Neil has taken flak from liberals for not acting quickly enough.

Democrats’ bid comes with its own controversy because it would go well beyond the few instances in which the law has been used over the past half century.

Critics say the effort will open the door to lawmakers weaponizing returns by releasing private information about their political opponents. The same rationale Democrats are using to seek Trump’s returns could be used to release others’ tax documents as well, they say.

