Trump should release taxes, but so should Jeff Dinowitz

On “Tax Day” (April 15), there were marches all over the country demanding that President Trump make public his income tax returns. A demand with which I most wholeheartedly agree, as evidently do local elected officials, Councilman Andrew Cohen and Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz. 

Councilman Cohen, as reported in the March 23 Political Arena column of this paper, has introduced a resolution in the city council designed to pressure lawmakers in Albany to pass the Tax Returns Uniformly Made Public, or TRUMP bill. He argued that “potential conflicts of interest due to a presidential candidate’s businesses and holdings can only be reviewed through public disclosure of tax returns.” 

Assemblyman Dinowitz was a co-signer of this Assembly-passed bill.

But, as we all know from past experience, presidents are not the only public servants subject to possible conflicts of interest (or criminal behavior), so are all elected officials, especially those who are lawyers. The New York state legislature, for example, has produced many corrupt individuals, including convicted felons, like former Assembly Speaker (and lawyer) Sheldon Silver, and former state senate majority leader (and lawyer) Dean Skelos.

In my letter to this paper last December, “Compel pols to show tax returns,” I referred to Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s proposal to expand the state’s financial disclosure law, to include all elected officials and their spouses who would be forced to reveal all sources of their private income. As you know, this proposal went nowhere, which is the main reason why these self-serving slime balls in the state legislature did not get their raises.

No ethics reform, no raises!

Year after year, polls show that people consider most politicians (especially lawyers) to be crooked, untrustworthy, and in the tank for special interests. Wouldn’t it be enlightening if we, the public, could examine their tax returns to find out what their sources of income are, and how much they make above their government salaries? And then try to find out what exactly they did to earn this money?

State attorney general Eric Schneiderman recently released his 2016 tax return, which revealed all his incoming, including the $2,368 he received for appearing on the television show “Blue Bloods.” Gov. Cuomo and Mayor de Blasio also have released their returns.

I am now asking Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz (co-signer of the TRUMP bill), who demands that the president release his tax return, to do the same. 

And here is the reason why I am asking for the public disclosure of this particular lawyer-legislator’s tax return.

In 2013, Oliver Koppell was term-limited out of his job as a councilman. At that time, the salary of a councilman was $112,500 yearly (it is now $148,500). Assemblyman Dinowitz in 2013 was (and is still) making $79,500, which a little math will show you is a difference of $33,000 per year, which I think most people will agree is a substantial sum.

Assemblyman Dinowitz, instead of picking his buddy Andrew Cohen for the job of councilman, could have easily taken the job himself — as anyone in Bronx politics knows. Why did Jeffrey Dinowitz pass up a job that would have paid him an extra $33,000 yearly, and save himself many 300-mile roundtrips to Albany?

The answer, my friends, is not blowing in the wind. It can probably be found in his tax returns.