Trump turns to Supreme Court a second time to stop release of his tax records

Donald Trump has asked the US Supreme Court to block a subpoena seeking the US president’s financial records.

Mr Trump has appealed several lower-court and appeals court decisions that have ruled in favour of releasing the documents, which have been requested by members of Congress as part of an ethics investigation and in a separate lawsuit from the Manhattan district attorney’s office.

He has sought to shield those records, bringing his appeal to the country’s highest court a second time.

The Supreme Court had previously put a freeze on the release of those documents from Mr Trump’s accounting firm Mazars USA before they are set to consider arguments in his separate appeal in the New York case. That case could be scheduled before the end of the year.

In their latest appeal to the Supreme Court, the president’s attorneys argue the case raises “important separation of powers questions concerning Congress’s authority to subpoena the personal records of a sitting president.”

This week, another federal court decision allowed for the release of the president’s financial records — as well as records from his children and businesses — from Deutsche Bank and Capital One.

A 106-page ruling from a three-judge panel at the US District Court of Appeals said the banks must hand over several years’ worth of the president’s records under a subpoena order from House Democrats.

Mr Trump is expected to appeal that decision as well.

All subpoena cases are separate from the current impeachment inquiry.

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