Donald Trump suffers bodyblow in the battle over his financial records

| 6:49 pm EDT May 14, 2019
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Even as everyone from Donald Trump’s banks to Donald Trump’s accounting firm have agreed to turn his financial records over to House Democrats, Trump has begun fighting in court to try to stop it from happening – or to at least drag out the process as long as possible. To that end, Trump just suffered a bodyblow in court.

Federal Judge Amit Mehta tipped his hand when he announced last week that he would be holding a hearing today, thus making clear that he had no interest in allowing his courtroom to be used for Donald Trump’s indefinite stall tactics. The judge didn’t issue a final ruling today. Instead he’s giving Trump forty-eight hours to submit any evidence to make his case about why his financial records shouldn’t be turned over, and then another forty-eight hours after that, the judge is prepared to make a ruling, according to NBC News. So where does this leave us?

The judge’s questions made clear that he doesn’t see any legal precedent for ruling that Donald Trump’s financial records shouldn’t be turned over to Congress. In other words, he’s very likely to rule on the 18th that the Mazars accounting firm can turn over Trump’s records. The proceedings led MSNBC legal analyst Glenn Kirschner to conclude that “It was a good day in court for the rule of law.”

Then again, Donald Trump never had any real shot at winning this legal battle. His only hope was to drag it out for so long that the results wouldn’t end up mattering. But at the rate this judge is moving, Trump’s strategy isn’t working. And if the judge does rule against Trump as expected, it’ll set a precedent when it comes to upcoming rulings in Trump’s cases against other financial institutions.