Trump asks the Supreme Court to keep his taxes secret after lower courts ordered him to turn the records over

• Trump's lawyers asked the Supreme Court to block Congress from obtaining years of his personal taxes.
• A federal appeals court panel cleared the way in August for the House Ways & Means Committee to get Trump's taxes.

Former President Donald Trump asked the Supreme Court on Monday to block the IRS from turning several years of Trump's personal tax returns to the House Committee on Ways & Means.

Trump filed an emergency application asking the nation's highest court to issue an emergency stay of a DC federal appeals court ruling ordering the former president to turn his tax records over to Congress.

In the filing, Trump accused lawmakers of trying to "expose" his tax information to the public "for the sake of exposure."

"The Committee's purpose in requesting President Trump's tax returns has nothing to do with funding or staffing issues at the IRS and everything to do with releasing the President's tax information to the public," the filing said.

The Washington, DC, federal appeals court panel in August cleared the way for the House committee to obtain Trump's taxes after years of back and forth between the committee and Trump's lawyers.

DC Circuit Court of Appeals Judge David B. Sentelle wrote that House Democrats' request for Trump's returns "did not violate separation of powers principles" and that lawmakers on the powerful House Ways and Means Committee have a legitimate reason to obtain the returns in order to better monitor the IRS' policy of auditing sitting presidents.

Sentelle, a Reagan appointee, wrote that Trump's concerns about some of his private financial information potentially being made public did not outweigh lawmakers' requests.

The court was also unmoved by arguments that allowing Congress to obtain Trump's returns would lead to an irrevocable fracture in the relationship between two key branches of government, potentially opening future presidents up to intimidation by lawmakers who could threaten to make their financial dealings public.

The ruling did not mean that Trump's returns will be made public, though Democratic Rep. Richard Neal, the chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, has previously said that some information might be made public in a full report to the House. The committee said shortly after the appeals court decision that it expected to obtain the "requested tax returns and audit files immediately."

Neal first requested six years of Trump's taxes from the IRS in April 2019 as part of a wide-ranging investigation into the agency's auditing process. The request came after Trump repeatedly refused to disclose his tax returns to the public, citing an ongoing audit.

The Treasury Department subsequently asked the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel for guidance on whether it should turn over the documents to Congress, saying it believed Neal's request was a "pretext" for the panel's "true purpose" of going on a fishing expedition through Trump's finances.

The OLC said in May 2019 that it believed the Treasury's determination was "reasonabl[e]" and that the committee did not have a legitimate legislative purpose in sifting through Trump's taxes. The Treasury Department then denied Neal's request.

The Ways and Means Committee later filed a lawsuit seeking to enforce its subpoena for Trump's taxes, and Neal sent another written request in June 2021 for the tax records from 2015 through 2020.

The Treasury Department again contacted the OLC for guidance on the matter, and in a July 2021 letter, a top OLC official wrote that the committee's investigation covers "a plainly legitimate area for congressional inquiry and possible legislation," and that it should therefore be granted access to Trump's taxes.

This story is developing. Please check back for updates.