New York state prosecutors, led by Manhattan district attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr., have subpoenaed President Trump’s accounting firm for records of his tax returns for the last eight years, according to a report from the New York Times.
The subpoena is part of an investigation into hush-money payments made by the president to adult-film actress Stormy Daniels during the 2016 presidential campaign. Trump’s lawyer and fixer, Michael D. Cohen, was convicted in federal court of breaking campaign-finance laws after paying $130,000 to Daniels, and received a three-year prison sentence.
Daniels claims that she had a sexual encounter with Trump in 2006 shortly after the birth of his son, Barron Trump, and received the payment in exchange for her silence on the matter.
The Manhattan D.A.’s office is looking into the possibility that the hush-money payments broke New York state law in addition to federal law. It was unclear, however, why prosecutors subpoenaed documents from as far back as 2011.
The subpoenaed tax returns include Trump’s personal returns as well as those of his company, the Trump Organization.
Congressional Democrats have been trying for years to force Trump to reveal his tax returns, and have subpoenaed six years of those documents from the Treasury Department. The president has fought back by challenging the subpoena in federal court, effectively tying up the release of the documents.