Wow, I get to make the first comment! How is anybody that paid any attention surprised by this.

Next you're going to tell me that a whole lot of Republican voters are complete fucking idiots.

"I could commit tax dodges on 5th Avenue and people would still vote for me."

This is not going to be the story that breaks through the shields. I have a very poor track record with predictions and I feel comfortable about making this one in the hope that I'm wrong. The response will be resoundingly as follows: haters gonna hate! Trump's family had a ton of money (good), screwed the IRS out of taking half of it (good), cleverly built it into a vaster fortune (WINNING), won the presidential election (YEP) and then reduced taxes on everyone else (goddam Robin Hood). He is making the world better for everyone in this pursuit of higher justice. He shouldn't even have to pardon himself for all of this stuff, that's just gauche. Also, you're defaming him by making it seem like a crime, because only losers commit crimes.

I'll be in quarantine if anyone needs me.

"I built what I built myself," Mr. Trump has said, a narrative that was long amplified by often-credulous coverage from news organizations, including The Times.

Indeed.

In the chauffeured Cadillac, Donald Trump took The Times's reporter on a tour of what he called his "jobs." He told her about the Manhattan hotel he planned to convert into a Grand Hyatt (his father guaranteed the construction loan), and the Hudson River railroad yards he planned to develop (the rights were purchased by his father's company). He showed her "our philanthropic endeavor," the high-rise for the elderly in East Orange (bankrolled by his father), and an apartment complex on Staten Island (owned by his father), and their "flagship," Trump Village, in Brooklyn (owned by his father), and finally Beach Haven Apartments (owned by his father). Even the Cadillac was leased by his father.

That's gotta sting.

This is not going to be the story that breaks through the shields.

I suppose this is right, but wow. As heebie says, it's a looong article, but it's just jammed with information.

Trump didn't go straight once he cashed his inheritance check, and one supposes that he didn't become a competent businessman, either. He's had a lucrative career as a TV personality, but somebody crooked has underwritten his business career.

This just ups the stakes for the election. Trump's more recent tax returns are going to be a very interesting read, if we ever get a look at them.

I think it's a perfect article for young adults and anyone else who doesn't have years of reading news under their belt and is just starting to get informed. It lays out everything that a more sophisticated reader might have been inferring.

Also frankly it lays out more than I was inferring.

By age 3, Mr. Trump was earning $200,000 a year in today's dollars from his father's empire

The use of "earning" there is a masterpiece.

By age 3, Mr. Trump was earning $200,000 a year in today's dollars from his father's empire

Has there ever been such a precocious genius? Eat your heart out, Mozart!

I don't think you can have a silver kegstand. It's an action performed on a keg by a person who uses the word "bro" without irony, not something that holds a keg up.

Donald Trump has a big mouth, but it turns out that's just about the only thing big about him.

I guess decency is truly dead in America, if Kevin Drum is making jokes about Trump's penis size.

And Fred supplied a bro, plated in silver.

I have done a keg stand, and yet have never called anyone "bro". Don't stereotype us, Moby. People from all walks of life can make poor lifestyle choices.

It doesn't count if you said it ironically.

It's an action performed on a keg by a person who uses the word "bro" without irony, not something that holds a keg up.

I was picturing the recipient, legs up in the air, silver funnel and keg, with silver relentlessly pouring down their gullet like they're being fattened up for silver foie gras.

Also I too have done a keg stand.

But have you ever been in a bar fight?

The French are more cruel to geese than I had imagined.

I have never done a keg stand or a beer bong. They just seem unpleasant.

17: I am suddenly curious if more people on unfogged will admit to having done a keg stand than owning a TV.

Never done a keg stand. Might have done a beer bong, not sure. Some beer people have at college parties, you just want to get it over with as quickly as possible. I miss some things about that time of my life but the quality of the alcohol isn't one of them.

My esophagus is a weak point, so I try not to abuse it.

21: Never did a keg stand, and I do own a TV.

I guess that makes me a total square. : (

21: I claim a keg stand and a TV stand.

I feel like "I don't even have a TV" fizzled out when:
1) TV started to become much, much better in the 2000s
2) So what, you're just watching on your laptop or tablet.

Or it got replaced with "I don't even have a smartphone" which probably has itself fizzled out by now? Because they're so great even if they give me neck problems and attention deficit problems?

And hundreds of millions of dollars that otherwise would have gone to the United States Treasury would instead go to Fred Trump's children.

Aren't you glad you paid Trump's taxes for him?

Trump's more recent tax returns are going to be a very interesting read, if we ever get a look at them.

It'll be Maxine Waters in charge of that, no? I swear, all these fuckers think there is no possibility of a different future.

Two years too late.

Also twenty years too late.

More political news: this article is about the transition in 2016/2017, and was actually published about a week ago, but I just saw it this morning. In one sense it's not news, we knew all along that it was a shambles. There have been a ton of stories about high turnover.

In another sense, it's impressive (a) that the process was this bad and (b) that, with (a) in mind, the results haven't been even worse. They're basically getting what they want and there haven't been literal disasters caused by disorganization (as opposed to competent implementation of bad policy). If it tells me anything, it's how much the Republicans in Congress must have been covering for them.

Does this article set Trump up to go to jail? I don't read NYT articles, only the commentary on them.

(I'm not reading it, but is there a section about how it is that the paper "of record" missed what's possibly the biggest fucking story of the century in their own fucking hometown because they were too busy with printing gossipy bullshit about Bill and the Hillary Clinton, modern love, real estate porn, cheerleading fake wars, 'trends' that involve 50 people in a city of millions, and all the rest that makes the newspaper unreadable?)

32: From what I hear, it's all past any statute of limitations, but the NYT evidently considers the charges so clear and well-founded that they were willing to say multiple times in the article, unqualified, "this was fraud", implying if Trump sued he would get no traction.

32: IANAL and only got about halfway through the article, but I don't think so, not even theoretically. All the tax fraud in it is past the statute of limitations. Sets him up for massive fines and back taxes, but not going behind bars.

33: They allude to their own failings to cover his career better twice, if I remember correctly. I agree, I would have liked to see a lot more of it.

I got the impression (from NPR, I think) that this article also makes the claim that Trump has tried to profit from the presidency but has failed. I didn't see the latter claim in my very brief skim of this very long article. Is it there? Or was NPR referring to a different article? Needless to say, I'm skeptical.

36: No, it doesn't.

Hmm, I wonder if NPR was softening their coverage by mixing in this bit of bad logic.

It's been noted that the criminal statute of limitations has passed, but there's no limitation on civil penalties. The IRS could take away a lot of his money.
When do we change IANAL to IBOOF?

WaPo is now reporting that New York tax authorities are investigating.

33, 35:

"I built what I built myself," Mr. Trump has said, a narrative that was long amplified by often-credulous coverage from news organizations, including The Times.

Later, the story discusses some specific crappy coverage from the Times.

It's a great story. Anyone else looking for a Pulitzer in public service journalism is just going to have to wait for next year.

From what I hear, it's all past any statute of limitations, but the NYT evidently considers the charges so clear and well-founded that they were willing to say multiple times in the article, unqualified, "this was fraud", implying if Trump sued he would get no traction.

But it's certainly making the IRS look pretty dumb. They should certainly be looking for anything that is within the statute of limitations now, right?

This was right around the time Gingrich et al. were slashing the IRS enforcement budget, and getting across the message that the rich should be rarely audited and the poor, often.

But it's certainly making the IRS look pretty dumb systematically underfunded and abused by Republicans to facilitate tax cheating by the rich.

FTFY.

Ugh, should have read one more comment before rage-commenting.

That was rage?

Rage at decades of Republican abuse of the tax system, not at the comment itself.

Also, I'm ethnically English and Swedish. We don't do rage particularly well (at least not any more).

Could his sister the judge be in trouble for her role? And what exactly did she do?

I think all we know is that she benefited from a bunch of fraudulent stuff that's outside the criminal statute of limitations but potentially still open on the civil side (although some of it was actually audited, badly, so?). And she's on senior status, so theoretically I suppose she could be impeached, but her brother is a more interesting target.

Oh hey, the NYT has a companion piece about precisely that, although focusing on the past ten years.

The recent articles (not exactly news, but renewed focus) about the underfunding of the IRS make me even more angry about my own, still ongoing, IMO still unreasonable tax audit process. There aren't enough funds to watch out for evasion by ~billionaires, but they still manage to go after my relatively penny-ante situation?

They need some peasants to take out their frustrations on.

31: Reading that article, I'd say the odds that Christie was Lewis's major source approach 1. Lots of stuff from Christie's POV about how he had prepared to effectively address one problem or another, only to have his efforts (and ultimately, his position) blown away. Doesn't mean it isn't accurate, but I wouldn't be surprised if it whitewashed Christie's role to some extent. (For example, it glides lightly over Christie's early endorsement of Trump, which gave him his initial access to the Trump team, without asking what that endorsement says about Christie's judgement.)

29, 33: I suspect this paragraph explains the timing of the reporting:

All County had no corporate offices. Its address was the Manhasset, N.Y., home of John Walter, a favorite nephew of Fred Trump's. Mr. Walter, who died in January, spent decades working for Fred Trump, primarily helping computerize his payroll and billing systems. He also was the unofficial keeper of Fred Trump's personal and business papers, his basement crowded with boxes of old Trump financial records. John Walter and the four Trump children each owned 20 percent of All County, records show.

Basically, I suspect that this reporting may be based in large measure on a lot of those old Trump financial records suddenly becoming available to reporters after Walter's death.

29, 33: I suspect this paragraph explains the timing of the reporting:

All County had no corporate offices. Its address was the Manhasset, N.Y., home of John Walter, a favorite nephew of Fred Trump's. Mr. Walter, who died in January, spent decades working for Fred Trump, primarily helping computerize his payroll and billing systems. He also was the unofficial keeper of Fred Trump's personal and business papers, his basement crowded with boxes of old Trump financial records. John Walter and the four Trump children each owned 20 percent of All County, records show.

Basically, I suspect that this reporting may be based in large measure on a lot of those old Trump financial records suddenly becoming available to reporters after Walter's death.

Also the Trump CFO mentioned at a couple of junctures but maybe less than you might expect given his job title is the one who is cooperating with the feds.

I suspect that this reporting may be based in large measure on a lot of those old Trump financial records suddenly becoming available to reporters after Walter's death.

The reporter Susanne Craig who worked on the NYT story all but said as much in various interviews in the last few days, though she didn't name Walter (just acknowledged that boxes of old paper records became available). Also said they'd been working on the story for the past 18 months.

56: I believe he is "cooperating" in limited ways specific to certain lines of inquiry. Would glad to be told that I am wrong.