Don’t stop at Trump. All candidates for office should disclose their tax returns | Jill Filipovic

Finally, at least some of Donald Trump's tax returns will be released to the public. This is an important step forward for political transparency, but it shouldn't be the last.

On Tuesday, the House ways and means committee voted to release six years of the former president's tax returns; the committee also revealed that, counter to standard protocol, the IRS had not audited Trump during his first two years in office - and that the IRS only began their audit once ways and means asked for the returns and audit records. Trump had repeatedly said that he was being audited during those two years, which was untrue.

This is a stunning breach. Trump had many notoriously shady friends, engaged in notoriously shady business dealings and notoriously avoided paying his fair share. While that wasn't necessarily a mystery - the New York Times obtained several years of his tax returns - it did pose a potential national security threat, and at the very least the IRS should have done its job.

The information released so far is depressing but predictable: Trump went to great lengths to avoid paying taxes. Despite significant wealth, he paid just $750 in income tax in 2015 and again in 2016. For years leading up to his time in office, he paid no federal income tax. While in the White House, he paid a bit more, but still a paltry fraction of his wealth.

This matters because (a) honesty matters and (b) taxes are how we keep the country running. Every tax dollar that Trump maneuvered to keep in his own pocket is a dollar that was taken away from healthcare, support for veterans, public education and provisions for the ageing. The kinds of tax maneuvers he engaged in may be common among wealthy business owners, but that doesn't necessarily make them legal or moral.

The IRS failed in its responsibilities here, reportedly due to the agent in charge of review being simply overwhelmed, and Trump's team fighting efforts to assign more resources to the audit. That in itself should have been a sign of something amiss - a president with something to hide or, at the very least, a man committed to shielding basic information from the public.

Trump's refusal to release his tax returns in the first place was a clear sign of his dishonesty. It wasn't against the law, but it was a break with longstanding norms for those running for president - norms of financial transparency that are crucial, and the lowest possible bar. That the former president couldn't (or wouldn't) clear that bar should have been disqualifying for any voter who believes that public servants have an obligation to serve, not simply to self-enrich.