On Friday, a federal appeals court granted Donald Trump and House Democrats the information they wanted in their ongoing legal battle for access to Trump’s financial records. Although the court ruled that the committee is authorized to obtain some records, it limited its scope.
This ruling was the latest in a series of actions by the House Oversight Committee, which sought to enforce a subpoena that had been issued to Trump’s accounting company, Mazars. After former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen testified at a congressional hearing, the House Oversight Committee sought the documents in 2019.
The Supreme Court heard the case and rejected Trump’s claim that records of a president were beyond Congress’ reach. However, it stated that the lower courts should respect separation of powers issues when requesting documents from a president.
The U.S. Court of Appeals, District of Columbia applied Friday’s ruling to provide more detail explanations of the committee’s needs and reasons.
A claim that Trump was no longer president made by the House was rejected by the appeals court. The Supreme Court’s guidance is no longer applicable because Trump is no longer president. “The subpoena sought information from a sitting president. The court stated that President Trump brought the challenge while still in office.
“If Congress had unlimited power to drown the president with burdensome requests as soon as he leaves office,” Congress might use the threat to impose a post-presidency pile on to try and influence the president’s behavior while in office.
The court denied Trump’s attorneys’ claim that the revised justification of the committee for the documents should not be ignored, as it was written after the original lawsuit was filed. Friday’s ruling however limited the number of documents that the committee could seek under the court’s “dragnet reach”.
The court ruled that the committee could only review records of Trump’s foreign and domestic payments while he was president to determine whether he violated the Constitution’s ban against outside emoluments.
It also restricted the timeframe for documents relating to Trump International Hotel, which Trump’s business leased from federal government. These documents were related to Trump’s financial disclosure filings.
Judge Judith Rogers concurred in the ruling and said that the court had balanced the committee’s legitimate legislative requirement for information with the concerns about the separation of power surrounding a congressional subpoena issued to a former president during his tenure, then reissued after his departure.
The unanimous ruling was jointly written by her and Judge Sri Srinivasan. Ketanji Brown, who was part of the three-judge panel at the time the case was argued was now a Supreme Court justice.
