DEBACLE

Christie: Tax Story ‘Very, Very Good’ for Trump

Calls Trump a “genius” who can fix the federal tax code.

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said on Sunday morning that a New York Times story showing that Donald Trump could have paid no federal income taxes for 18 years after posting a nearly $1 billion loss in 1995 is actually “very, very good” for the Republican presidential nominee. The former GOP presidential candidate himself added that Trump “fought and clawed back” after the financial loss, and was always in compliance with the law.

“The New York Times does not have any information in that story that says Mr. Trump did not pay taxes,” Christie said on Fox News Sunday. “All they did was quote the law, which says if you have that kind of loss that you can use that kind of loss to offset income for 18 years.”

Host Chris Wallace pressed Christie on why the campaign did not push back on the assumption that Trump did not pay any federal income taxes in the years after 1995. Christie cited the campaign’s long-standing argument that the returns are under audit and therefore the information contained inside them cannot be revealed.

Trump and his surrogates have argued that the billionaire businessman is the best person to upend the tax code because of his experience with it over many decades. “I know our complex tax laws better than anyone who has ever run for president and am the only one who can fix them,” Trump tweeted Sunday morning.

—Andrew Desiderio

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