By Jesus Garcia
President Donald Trump asked the Southern District Court of Florida to dismiss his $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS.
The document sent to the court, which also specifies as plaintiffs the sons of President Donald J. Trump Jr., Eric Trump, as well as the Trump Organization, LLC.
“Through their undersigned lawyers, they notify the voluntary withdrawal of this lawsuit definitively,” says the judicial document.
President Trump has faced criticism over the lawsuit that sought multimillion-dollar payouts at the expense of Americans’ taxes.
The president accused the IRS of damages for the leak of his tax report, which led to a contractor being imprisoned, while the Treasury Department canceled its contracts with the company that employed the person responsible for the leak.
The lawyers for the president and his family, Alejandro Brito and Daniel Z. Epstein, pointed out that the court does not even need to take any additional action, due to the voluntary withdrawal of the lawsuit.
“The action ends when the lawsuit is filed, and ‘[n]or no order of the district court is required to give effect to the dismissal.’ After the presentation of this Notice, no judicial analysis proceeds,” the judicial document states.
The withdrawal of the lawsuit occurred just hours after the Justice Department announced a “fund against weaponizing” judicial processes, as part of an agreement with Trump.
In a statement, the Department led by prosecutor Todd Blanche – Trump’s former top lawyer – mentions the agreement with the president and his sons Trump Jr., Eric and the Trump Organization, LLC.
“Government machinery should never be used as a weapon against any American citizen, and it is the intention of this Department to right the wrongs committed previously and ensure that this does not happen again,” Blanche stated. “As part of this agreement, we are establishing an upright process so that victims of the instrumentalization of legislation can be heard and obtain redress.”
An unusual demand
The upright process initiated by President Trump was unusual, unprecedented, for a president to sue an institution under his control.
Following the lawsuit filed in January of this year, Amy Hanauer, executive director of the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, acknowledged that the leak of tax information was illegal, but revealed how President Trump did not pay taxes.
“Under laws designed to protect the wealthy from public scrutiny, such a leak was illegal, but it revealed information Americans deserved to know,” Hanauer said. “It confirmed our worst fears about a tax system that often allows the wealthiest people to pay a much smaller share of their income in federal taxes than the rest of us.”
The expert also noted that Trump “broke with long-standing precedent” by refusing to disclose his tax and financial details.
