When Mitt Romney and Rick Perry aren’t berating each other on the debate stage, with body language more befitting a bar fight, their campaigns are busy lobbing highly charged attacks back and forth: “Ponzi scheme,” “Romneycare,” “no heart” (on immigration),” “flip-flop.” And the newest verbal grenade: “tax returns.”
Earlier this week Perry spokesman Mark Miner toldPolitico, which had first reported the story, that “Governor Perry has always released his tax returns and Mitt Romney and the other candidates should do the same.” If history is any indication, watch for Perry to push that theme hard, and for Romney to remain firm in his decision to keep his returns private. “We’ll take a look at the question of releasing tax returns during the next tax filing season,” says Romney spokeswoman Andrea Saul about the Perry campaign’s request. By then, of course, the primary campaign could be effectively over.
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Perry communications director Ray Sullivan responds: “Governor Perry made a decision a long time ago in the interest of disclosure and transparency [that] he would make his personal tax returns available. That is a wise thing to do and helps gain the trust of the voters. It would be for other candidates to do the same.” Will Perry himself start calling on Romney and others to release their tax returns? “That remains to be seen.”
For both men, this is not the first time a campaign has included a “tax returns” chapter. Although Romney has campaigned on the issue, he has never released a tax return, while Perry has released his returns dating back to 1987, according to the Texas Tribune.
For Perry, the issue first arose in 1998. During a heated debate, John Sharp, Perry’s Democratic opponent in the lieutenant governor’s race, called on Perry to release his tax returns. A week later, Perry made his returns from 1991 to 1996 (the most recent years he had filed for) publicly available, according to the Dallas Morning News.
In Perry’s 2002 gubernatorial race against Democrat Tony Sanchez, tax returns again played a role, and this time Perry’s camp was the aggressor. “The people of Texas deserve to know the financial history of the men and women who seek to represent them,” argued Deirdre Delisi, Perry’s campaign manager at the time. Sanchez released partial information about his finances for the previous decade, but Perry kept demanding that he release his complete returns.
In the 2010 gubernatorial race, Perry refused to debate with Democratic opponent Bill White until White released his tax returns. When White released the returns from 2009, Perry continued to push: He wanted returns from the years when White was deputy secretary of energy in the Clinton administration. “He needs to come clean with the people of this state,” Perry said of White. “There’s obviously something in those tax returns, or he would have released them by now.”
The Perry campaign has no plans to tie debate appearances to tax-return releases in this race, but for Perry, a man of significantly more modest means than Romney, pushing the issue could underscore Romney’s wealth in a time of economic hardship for many. It’s unclear how well that would work in a Republican primary — in which voters are more interested in becoming the 1 percent than attacking it — but for Perry, it would be a return to a familiar strategy.
Perry is irrelevant, who cares what he wants. He should stop making strange speeches, crawl back to TX with his GWB advisors, and stop trying to reelect Obama.
If the best he can do against Romney is whine that he should disclose his tax returns, Perry is in real trouble. Memo to Perry: You are not running for President of Texas. You are in the big league now so start acting like it.
It has got to be a Freudian slip, given that Katrina and the rest of the NROniks won't admit to being in the tank for Romney.
If you follow their debate Twitter feeds, it's quite clear who they are rooting for and who they are launching spitballs at.
So they proceed with perpetuating the inevitability meme merely by insinuating that everyone they know is measuring Oval Office windows for Romney's drapes.
It's quite clubby at NRO---if Levin, Steyn, and McCarthy weren't standing in the corner muttering occasionally what conservative would bother coming here at all anymore?
I agree with transparency. Admittedly, this article and activity is hedged on two GOP candidates, but the POTUS campaigned on honesty and openness and we've gotten neither.
I would like for a candidate to offer up his return to better understand what the motivations are to run for office.
As an accountant, I love looking at tax returns prepared by others! Interesting to see his big capital loss carryforward - he must have taken a big hit in the Blind Trust.
Rick Perry needs to be careful what he wishes for. I don't think anyone would be surprised to learn that Mitt Romney is very wealthy. It's not going to be big shocker. However,the amount of his charity giving will probably put Ricky's to shame.
Sorry my friends. Rick Perry is the most authentic conservative in the race. No one in this contest can sniff his credentials. He is the current govenor of the most productive, economically powerful, diverse, and dynamic state in the union - hands down. Too many people here and elsewhere - particularly in the snootish society of the DC Axis, on flowered display here at NRO - suffer a serious case of Texas envy. I understand it; as a Texan I have learned to live with the passive-aggressive snide-ness of state envy. It makes me laugh. But what doesn't make me laugh is the complete buffoonery this sort of elitism is so eager to push on the rest of us. For goodness sake, how can Ms. Lopez, an ardent Catholic (as am I), make do with someone who offered abortion for a $50 copay?? How does that squarest of pegs fit into a round hole? Pick the issue - Slick Willard has been for it and against it. Even today, Ms. Lopez opines that "Perry is Wrong!!!" about people changing in their 50's and 60's - totally missing the point that Govenor Perry was making, that on core issues, Slick Willard has held all the positions there are to hold. Just like Fred Thompson in 08, and now Rick Perry, NR is disparaging the most conservative candidate in the race for one of their east-coast-own. Shame, shame. Me, I'll sit back and watch, listen, and take note. Like the folks calling his friendly, relaxed, human, humorous, and fantastic speech in New Hampshire being dogged by the media. Remember "Fred Thompson is lazy!!!???" Same trick at work here. Only difference is that Rick Perry has money, and will probably get more. He's here to stay. And if he continues the way of that speech in New Hampshire, he'll get more. As someone noted earlier, do not count this man out. If you do, I'll chalk it up to your state-envy getting the best of you.
If they are so concerned with saving taxpayers money, why did they change to where a taxpayer has to pay someone to file their tax return on the internet? Somebody is making money out of the use of the cards just like when having to pay to file your return electronically. They will still get my return by mail and not make any refund by car href="http://www.accountancyhere.com">tax returnt
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