Published
4 years agoon
SACRAMENTO — Four California voters have sued to block a new state law aimed at forcing Republican President Donald Trump to release his income tax returns.
Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a law last week that requires presidential candidates to file five years of their income tax returns with the California secretary of state. Candidates who don’t comply will not appear on the March 3 presidential primary ballot.
Related Story: Newsom Signs Tax-Returns Law Aimed at Trump
The conservative group Judicial Watch announced Monday it had filed a lawsuit last week to challenge the law. The four plaintiffs are two Republicans, one Democrat and one independent.California’s law says voters need to know details about presidential candidates’ finances to “better estimate the risks of any given Presidential candidate engaging in corruption.”
But Judicial Watch argues that rationale could lead states to demand things like medical and mental health records and eventually things like Amazon purchases, Google search histories and Facebook friends.
The organization also argues that by limiting the law to primary elections, it does not apply to independent candidates. Judicial Watch also says the law violates voters’ constitutional rights to associate with presidential candidates and the voters who support them, rights it says are guaranteed under the First and 14th amendments.
The lawsuit names Secretary of State Alex Padilla as the defendant because his office is in charge of enforcing the law. Representatives for Padilla and Newsom declined to comment on Monday, saying they have not been officially notified of the lawsuit.
Speaking with reporters outside of an unrelated event at the governor’s office, California Attorney General Xavier Becerra said: “We’ll be ready to do what we need to do defend California’s laws.”
When he signed the law last week, Newsom released statements from three lawyers, including the dean of the University of California, Berkeley law school, saying the law is constitutional.
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