U.S. Dmocratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton on Friday released her 2015 tax returns and stepped up pressure on her Republican opponent Donald Trump to make his tax returns public.
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Hillary Clinton released her 2015 tax returns on Friday, showing she and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, earned $10.6 million and paid roughly a third of that in federal income tax.
In 2015, the Clintons made $1 million in charitable contributions, mostly to the Clinton Foundation; former President Bill Clinton brought in almost $5.3 million in speaking fees; and the former secretary of state reported income of $3 million from publisher Simon & Schuster for her book on her tenure at the State Department. The couple reported just over $300,000 in adjusted gross income a year ago, a small fraction of what the Clintons made.
Presidential candidates typically release their tax returns to the media to show their effective tax rate, charitable donations and other financial details.
But billionaire Mr Trump has declined to release his, arguing that his tax returns for the past several years are being audited.
Trump’s running mate, Mike Pence, has yet to say if he will release his taxes, which he has not done as governor of Indiana.
“Hillary Clinton and Tim Kaine continue to set the standard for financial transparency”, said Clinton’s campaign aide Jennifer Palmieri in a statement. The Clintons donated as much to charity past year as Trump did to the veterans in 20l6.
The Clinton campaign gleefully pointed all of this out and also released a video that included Republicans like Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and former presidential nominee Mitt Romney calling for his returns to be released in press clips.
The New York businessman has refused to disclose any of his tax returns, saying they are no one’s business and reveal little. “What is he trying to hide?” The Clintons paid $43.9 million in federal taxes over those years – an average tax rate that works out to 31.6 percent.
Most of the income came from Clinton’s speaking fees as Hillary has been campaigning for president. Republicans have seized upon the millions in speaking fees and a tone-deaf comment by Clinton in a 2014 interview that she was “dead broke” after leaving the White House in 2001.
“He refuses to do what every other presidential candidate in decades has done and release his tax returns”, she told the crowd.
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Bill Clinton’s office previously said he had ended his consulting work with Laureate previous year.
