House Speaker Paul Ryan (R) is imposing that GOP Presidential Candidate Donald Trump should follow suit and become transparent with his earnings as he is the only major-party candidate since 1976 not to release his tax returns.
Paul Ryan, 2012 GOP vice-presidential nominee, told reporters Thursday that he released his as required, but did not press on the timing for Mr. Trump.
"I know he is under an audit and he has got an opinion about when to release those. I will defer to him on that," Mr. Ryan said.
Democrats have criticized Mr. Trump for not releasing his tax returns and pressed the issue on Thursday, with Oregon's Democratic Senator Ron Wyden seeking a vote on legislation to make the release of income tax returns of any presidential nominee to the public mandatory.
Meanwhile, Connecticut's Democratic Senator Chris Murphy is inciting that Mr. Trump is more intent on running to protect his family's financial interests instead of protecting national security.
As usual, Republicans blocked the effort by putting a momentary spotlight on Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, saying they would only go along if Democrats agreed to allow a vote on stripping the security clearance of anyone found to have been extremely careless in handling classified information.
Trump so far declined to follow the precedent set since 1976 stating that the reason for this is that his income tax returns are under audit by the IRS, an explanation that many people find disconcerting since there is no reason at all that audited returns can't be released to the public.
Donald Trump Jr. on the other hand, spoke with the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review explaining that releasing his father's complicated tax returns would serve as a distraction to the campaign.
When asked why his father has not released his tax returns, Mr. Trump Jr. said, "Because he's got a 12,000-page tax return that would create ... financial auditors out of every person in the country asking questions that would detract from (his father's) main message."
