Over the last several weeks, The New York Times has published the findings of its investigation into more than 20 years of President Trump’s federal income tax records — information that he has fought to keep hidden in defiance of presidential tradition.
That series of reports is the culmination of work that began more than four years ago, with a scoop in a mailed manila envelope in the final weeks of the 2016 presidential campaign: three pages from Mr. Trump’s 1995 income tax returns. The resulting story, reporting that Mr. Trump had declared a $916 million business loss that year, offered a glimpse into the opaque finances of a man running for president, in large part, on his image as a self-made and wildly successful business mogul.
Since then, by obtaining and reporting on a growing body of his tax information, a group of Times journalists has continued to expand public understanding of the president’s business career.
Their reporting chronicles how Mr. Trump’s father bankrolled his first fortune, his history of deploying often questionable methods to avoid paying taxes, the billions of dollars in business losses that have defined his career and the real and potential conflicts of interest accompanying his time in the White House. Together, the articles below offer the most complete portrait ever assembled of this president’s singularly complex finances.
â—
Tax records that Mr. Trump long fought to keep secret show how years of business losses allowed him to avoid paying federal income taxes for much of the last two decades.
The success of “The Apprentice†revived Mr. Trump’s moribund career by creating a narrative of a masterful businessman that ultimately helped propel him to the presidency.
â—
More than $21 million in unusual payments flowed to Mr. Trump through companies tied to his Las Vegas hotel as his 2016 campaign was short on cash.
â—
The tax records provide a detailed accounting of the president’s business career — the losses, the looming financial threats and a huge, contested refund from the I.R.S.
â—
After his election, Mr. Trump’s hotels and clubs replaced the Washington “swamp†as the preferred venue for favor-seeking businesses and foreign dignitaries.
â—
The tax records reveal the president’s previously unknown bank account in China, where he spent more than a decade chasing business deals.
Despite claims of generous donations, the vast bulk of Mr. Trump’s philanthropy has involved tax-avoiding pledges not to develop land.
â—
When a skyscraper project soured, Mr. Trump managed to walk away from about $270 million in debts and avoid most of the resulting taxes.
â—
Tax information from the 1980s and 1990s charts a tumultuous chapter in the president’s boom-and-bust business career.
â—
A Times investigation punctured Mr. Trump’s self-made-billionaire myth, showing how his career was propelled by questionable tax-avoidance strategies and hundreds of millions of dollars from his father.
â—
An anonymously mailed package opened a window onto Mr. Trump’s finances, revealing his 1995 tax records and a loss of $916 million.
â—
Mr. Trump, employing a strategy later outlawed by Congress, escaped paying taxes on hundreds of millions of dollars of income.
