Mitt Romney Is Now Running Interference on Trump's Tax Returns, Because Of Course He Is

That the IRS is legally obligated to turn the president*'s tax returns over to the Congress now that House Ways and Means chairman Richard Neal has requested them is beyond dispute. It is, as any regular viewer of Law and Order would put it, black-letter law. Therefore, any attempt to take the president* seriously in his resistance to handing them over is both lawless and ridiculous. Jonathan Chait has a nifty wrap-up of the many contortionists taking the president*s side in this. But we should cast a cold eye on one of them in particular—namely Willard Romney, the junior senator from Utah and the 2012 Republican nominee for President of these United States. Of all the Mitt Romneys in the Republican Party, he remains the Mitt Romneyist.

Over the weekend, he popped up on Meet the Press to Mitt Romney the problem in the quintessential Mitt Romneyish way.

"I'd like the president to follow through and show his tax returns...But I also have to tell you, I think the Democrats are just playing along his handbook, which is that going after his tax returns through a legislative action is moronic. That's not going to happen. The courts are not going to say you can compel a person running for office to release their tax returns. So he's going to win this victory. He wins them time after time."

Mitt, my dude, the Congress already has said they can go after his tax returns through a legislative action. There's no question about this. Basically, Mitt, my dude, what you're saying is that the only non-moronic way to proceed is to allow the president* to break the law. This is an interesting political philosophy and I would like to subscribe to your newsletter.

Romney puts on a brave face. Chip Somodevilla Getty Images

No prominent Republican has played the role of reluctant leather-slave to the president* as well as Mitt Romney has. He gave that stunning speech during the 2016 campaign, and then allowed himself to be pitched as Secretary of State. During the campaign, he even suggested that there might be a "bombshell" in the president*'s returns, which is the safest bet on the board at this point. From Yahoo! News:

“I think there’s something there,” he said in February 2016 on Fox News. “Either he’s not anywhere near as wealthy as he says he is or he hasn’t been paying the kind of taxes we would expect him to pay, or perhaps he hasn’t been giving money to the vets or to the disabled like he’s been telling us he’s doing.”

Now, however, it is "moronic" for a Democratic committee chairman to demand that to which the law clearly says the Congress has a right in order to see what, if anything, that bombshell might be. And the hell of it is that, in a different reality, Mitt Romney is one of the few Republicans alive who could mount a credible primary challenge to El Caudillo del Mar-a-Lago. He's got the name, and he's a senator now, and he's actually as rich as the president* pretends to be, and he can raise bargeloads of cash. The Never Trumpers would carry him around Iowa on their shoulders.

But, then again, he is who he is. And you'll never be able to make chicken salad out of Mitt Romney.

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