Trump went to wrong court on tax issue

The US District Court for the District of Columbia dismissed President Donald Trump’s lawsuit against New York officials because the DC court lacked personal jurisdiction over the New York officials, notes a Jurist report. Judge Nichols determined that the lawsuit against the New York officials, New York Attorney-General Letitia James and Commissioner Michael R Schmidt, could not be pursued in DC because as New York residents they had no significant contacts with DC and therefore were not under the court’s jurisdiction. Trump had filed this lawsuit in the DC District Court against the officials and the House Committee on Ways and Means in an effort to stop the release of his New York tax returns. Trump alleged in his complaint that the TRUST Act, a New York law which allows the commissioner to share the President’s New York tax returns when requested by one of the US congressional tax committees, was a violation of Article I of the US Constitution and of his First Amendment rights (claiming that the Act was enacted in retaliation against his politics and speech). This decision does not preclude the President from suing the officials in a court that has jurisdiction over them or from suing them in DC if something that would give DC jurisdiction over them occurs in the future, says the report.