(JustPatriots.com)- President Donald Trump is fighting hard to keep his accounting records out of a criminal investigation.
On Thursday, a federal judge ruled state prosecutors in New York could have access to Trump’s records. US District Judge Victor Marrero’s ruling follows that of a Supreme Court decision from this summer that found that Trump doesn’t have presidential immunity from this inquiry.
Trump has already appealed the ruling, asking the Second Circuit Court of Appeals for emergency action. He’s attempting to stop enforcement of the subpoena, which could happen next week.
It’s possible that if courts continue to rule against him, Trump could have his tax records released to a grand jury before November’s election.
In his ruling, Marrero wrote:
“Justice requires an end to this controversy.”
The office of Cyrus Vance, the Manhattan District Attorney, has been investigating whether the president and the Trump Organization violated New York law when hush money payments were made to two women who alleged before the 2016 election that they had affairs with Trump.
The investigation is trying to reveal whether the organization or Trump himself falsified business records that were filed with New York state, and whether they violated tax laws as well.
Trump sued the district attorney to halt the subpoena by a grand jury of Mazars USA, his accounting firm. Vance is searching to look through years of his accounting records. The judge, though, said that case was valid no longer and needed to be tossed from court.
Vance has said that his office’s investigation doesn’t just involve the hush money payments, though. The investigation spans years into possible fraud. Michael Cohen, Trump’s former attorney who is now a convicted felon, has publicly accused Trump in the past of inflating the assets he had to insurers and banks. Vance has interviewed Cohen as part of his investigation.
Trump’s argument against the subpoena was that it was too broad. He also argues he has protection from any criminal investigation, as his role as president gives him “sweeping immunity.”
But Judge Marrero disagreed, calling Trump’s argument “as unprecedented and far-reaching as it is perilous to the rule of law and other bedrock constitutional principles on which this country was founded and by which it continues to be governed.”
In his opinion, Marrero also rejected Trump’s accusation that the subpoena only served to aid Democrats who for years have wanted to expose the president’s tax records so they could use it for political gain.
On this topic, Marrero wrote:
“While the Mazars Subpoena may well have been issued for that particular purpose, the lack of specific facts tying the Mazars Subpoena to those politicians prevents the Court from reasonably inferring that the Mazars Subpoena reflects an effort to advance the Democrats’ goals rather than legitimate ones.”
It is ironic, though, that House Democrats issued a subpoena for the same exact records as Vance has. Trump’s challenge to that request hasn’t been resolved in federal trial court following the summer Supreme Court ruling.
