As we reported earlier, the New York Times claims they have obtained nearly two decades of Trump-related tax return data, for him and hundreds of related companies that make up his organization.

Now, there are a lot of questions here, starting with who leaked the data.

The New York Times says it was someone who had a legal right to the data. But that doesn’t mean they had a legal right to leak it. Money bet is obviously on Democrats trying to do a hit on Trump in the final days before the election. And there’s definitely got to be an investigation into this because there’s no question the leak was illegal/improper, even if the person who leaked it might have been legally allowed to have the information.

But while Democrats were trying to do a hit on Trump, it may turn out to have the opposite effect.

Trump has been saying that he wasn’t releasing his taxes because he was under audit. Indeed, according to the New York Times, Trump has, in fact, been under an audit for about ten years, proving he was telling the truth.

The reason why is actually rather funny and all because of Barack Obama.

The NYT confirms Trump was telling the truth about being under audit. https://t.co/abF9cV8z4A pic.twitter.com/dF0iuA067e

— Greg Pollowitz (@GPollowitz) September 27, 2020

From the NY Times:

But to turn that long arc of failure into a giant refund check, he relied on some deft accounting footwork and an unwitting gift from an unlikely source — Mr. Obama.

Business losses can work like a tax-avoidance coupon: A dollar lost on one business reduces a dollar of taxable income from elsewhere. The types and amounts of income that can be used in a given year vary, depending on an owner’s tax status. But some losses can be saved for later use, or even used to request a refund on taxes paid in a prior year.

Until 2009, those coupons could be used to wipe away taxes going back only two years. But that November, the window was more than doubled by a little-noticed provision in a bill Mr. Obama signed as part of the Great Recession recovery effort. Now business owners could request full refunds of taxes paid in the prior four years, and 50 percent of those from the year before that.

So, if you have any issue with the way Trump got a refund and then didn’t have to pay more, blame Barack Obama; it was perfectly legal because of the law that he signed. So Democrats really can’t attack Trump for using a law they put in place that he was perfectly entitled to use. Bottom line? I want someone who actually has the business acumen to employ what he can within the law, that’s the guy I want in charge of the economy.

Another big item to put paid to Democratic collusion theories — the NY Times found no previously unknown ties to Russia in the records. Or anything apparently illegal. That was another thing which Democrats have been hoping to find and that just got blown apart big time.

Now, the President has disputed the accuracy of some of what the New York Times has said. No doubt he’s bothered that someone illegally leaked the information. But seriously, not only doesn’t it seem to be troubling, it looks on first blush like it puts paid to all the Democratic conspiracy theories against him.

So nice job, New York Times!

HT: Twitchy