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Speaker 1: Welcome to the Bloomberg Law Podcast. I'm June Grosso. Every

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Speaker 1: day we bring you insight and analysis into the most

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Speaker 1: important legal news of the day. You can find more

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Speaker 1: episodes of the Bloomberg Law Podcast on Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud

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Speaker 1: and on Bloomberg dot com Slash podcasts. The second legal

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Speaker 1: laws for President Trump in a week in his effort

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Speaker 1: to keep his financial records from being disclosed to lawmakers.

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Speaker 1: A federal judge in New York rule wednesday that Trump

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Speaker 1: cannot block subpoenas that House Democrats sent to Deutsche Bank

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Speaker 1: in Capital One asking for his financial records. That matches

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Speaker 1: the ruling of a federal judge in d C that

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Speaker 1: Trump could not block a subpoena sent to his accounting

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Speaker 1: firm for financial records. Joining me is from a federal

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Speaker 1: prosecutor Robert Mints, a partner McCarter in English Bob. Both

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Speaker 1: judges found that Trump was unlikely to succeed on the

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Speaker 1: merits in those cases. How significant are those rulings, Well,

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Speaker 1: they are very significant as far as they go. The

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Speaker 1: Trump lawyers have indicated that they will be appealing both

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Speaker 1: those decisions, and the House has agreed to delay the

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Speaker 1: enforcement of those subpoenas to allow those appeals to proceed.

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Speaker 1: But I think we can expect that those appeals will

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Speaker 1: be dealt with fairly quickly, and it's probably likely that

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Speaker 1: the appeals courts will uphold the lower court decisions in

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Speaker 1: both cases. So two swift, decisive rulings Judge Ramos rule

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Speaker 1: from the bench in New York and Judge made It

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Speaker 1: took just a few days in d C. Does that

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Speaker 1: equate with the strength of the Democrats arguments here, Well,

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Speaker 1: it certainly suggests that, at least in the mind of

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Speaker 1: those two district court judges, the issue was not really

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Speaker 1: a close one. In fact, the language that Judge Ramos

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Speaker 1: used in New York and the decision the other day

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Speaker 1: was fairly broad and very decisive, and the judge in

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Speaker 1: that case said that Congress had very broad authority to

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Speaker 1: invest of gate matters related to possible legislation, and he

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Speaker 1: went on to say that it doesn't mean that the

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Speaker 1: powers are limited two issues that directly are related to

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Speaker 1: contemplated legislation or bills, but includes really broad oversight um

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Speaker 1: that would involve many functions, including looking into corruption. Inefficient use,

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Speaker 1: inefficiencies are waste in federal government agencies and that sort

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Speaker 1: of thing, and that the power of Congress to conduct

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Speaker 1: these investigations is inherent in the legislative process. That's very

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Speaker 1: broad and very strong language that gives Congress almost unbridened

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Speaker 1: authority to look into these issues. So, now do you

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Speaker 1: think that the appellate courts will confirm or affirm the

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Speaker 1: judge's rulings? That means it will go to the Supreme Court.

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Speaker 1: Is the Supreme Court likely to take this case? Well,

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Speaker 1: that's really the big question. Uh. You know, generally courts

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Speaker 1: are unwilling or reluctant to to wade into these kinds

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Speaker 1: of political disputes. And the problem here that is e

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Speaker 1: teed up is this is a battle between the privacy

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Speaker 1: rights of the Trump organization, President Trump and his family

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Speaker 1: versus the proper role of congressional oversight. And to determine

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Speaker 1: whether or not Congress is exceeding its authority really requires

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Speaker 1: the courts to get into the mind of Congress and

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Speaker 1: try to figure out what's behind these inquiries. That's a

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Speaker 1: difficult thing to do with something courts are generally reluctant

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Speaker 1: to do. And as long as there are some facially

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Speaker 1: valid reason to allow these subpoenas to proceed. I think

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Speaker 1: we can expect the courts will allow them to go

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Speaker 1: forward and we'll uphold the subpoenas. So we'll have to

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Speaker 1: see whether Supreme Court takes this case. But if it does,

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Speaker 1: even if it does, I think it's unlikely that the

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Speaker 1: Supreme Court is going to reign in Congress because I'm

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Speaker 1: just not quite sure how they draw the lines here.

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Speaker 1: Now we've heard talk, and there's been a pressing talk

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Speaker 1: about impeachment. Apparently Nancy Pelosi's caucus, the more progressive members

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Speaker 1: and even some of the not so progressive members are

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Speaker 1: pushing her toward impeachment. Would impeachment help any of these

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Speaker 1: quests for Donald Trump's financial records, with the fact that

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Speaker 1: there's an impeachment proceeding make the argument stronger. Well, that's

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Speaker 1: the argument that some have raised by saying that impeachment

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Speaker 1: necessarily looks at the conduct of the president and whether

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Speaker 1: or not the Congress, whether or not the president may

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Speaker 1: have committed high crimes and misdemeanors. So that would, at

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Speaker 1: least in the mind of some people, bolster the argument

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Speaker 1: for for Congress wading into these areas. That the Trump

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Speaker 1: organization and the Trump's and Trump's lawyers have argued, really

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Speaker 1: are private issues that have nothing to do with his

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Speaker 1: role as president. But I think in light of these rulings,

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Speaker 1: were unlikely to see Congress move in that direction. They

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Speaker 1: now have two strong rulings from lower courts, and unless

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Speaker 1: those decisions are overturned, there's really no need for for

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Speaker 1: Congress to go down that road at this time. Do

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Speaker 1: you know what kinds of financial records they're attempting to

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Speaker 1: get from Deutsche Bank and and from the accountants. Uh,

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Speaker 1: they're they're pretty broad requests, and even the court acknowledge

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Speaker 1: that that these were undeniably broad. But the court in

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Speaker 1: in in the New York case said that they were

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Speaker 1: clearly pertinent to the facially legitimate investigations that were being

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Speaker 1: run by Congress here. But they are records concerning um,

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Speaker 1: you know, all types of um interactions that the president

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Speaker 1: and the Trump organization had with Deutsche Bank and with

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Speaker 1: Capital One, And obviously the subpoena for his accountant former

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Speaker 1: accounting firm would be all matters related to his prior

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Speaker 1: tax filings and would certainly include some of the tax

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Speaker 1: returns themselves. So undeniably they're very broad. I don't think

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Speaker 1: there's any question about that. The question is whether Congress

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Speaker 1: has the legitimate right, through its oversight authority to ask

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Speaker 1: for this information. Just about a minute here, Bob, I'm

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Speaker 1: wondering if the subpoena of minution for the tax returns

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Speaker 1: and the tax records, would the same argument be made

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Speaker 1: in that case or different argument because it's based on

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Speaker 1: a on a law that says shall provide Yeah, that's

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Speaker 1: a little bit different because their Congress is proceeding under

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Speaker 1: that statute that you referenced, where it does seem to

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Speaker 1: give Congress the right to request the tax returns of

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Speaker 1: any U. S citizen it says shall provide um. But

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Speaker 1: but that's something where I think the line is is

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Speaker 1: a little bit closer. Um. It doesn't really it's not

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Speaker 1: really involving Congress's oversight authority to hold hearings and that

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Speaker 1: sort of thing. It really is a focus on as

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Speaker 1: to whether or not that language um is something that

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Speaker 1: is mandatory or whether the courts can look behind the

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Speaker 1: intent of Congress and requesting that tax information. All right, thanks, Bob,

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Speaker 1: that's revert. Men's a partner McCarter in English. This is

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Speaker 1: Bloomberg Thanks for listening to the Bloomberg Law Podcast. You

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Speaker 1: can subscribe and listen to the show on Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud,

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Speaker 1: and on bloomberg dot com slash podcast. I'm June Brosso.

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Speaker 1: This is Bloomberg