The Daily Fuckup

Donald Trump asked the Supreme Court on October 31, 2022 to intervene in a long-running fight over six years of his tax returns and related records. His emergency application sought a stay of the mandate from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, which had upheld the House Ways and Means Committee’s request for the IRS materials. The Supreme Court docket shows the case was filed that day and titled Donald J. Trump, et al. v. Committee on Ways and Means, U.S. House of Representatives, et al. ([supremecourt.gov](https://www.supremecourt.gov/docket/docketfiles/html/public/22A362.html))

The filing asked the court to block the IRS from handing over the records while Trump pursued further review. In the application, Trump’s lawyers argued that the committee lacked a proper legislative purpose and that immediate disclosure would cause irreparable harm because the information would no longer be confidential once released. The application also said the dispute involved the risk that the case could become moot before the court could hear it. ([supremecourt.gov](https://www.supremecourt.gov/DocketPDF/22/22A362/244359/20221031120700985_Ways%20and%20Means%20emergency%20application%20to%20file.pdf))

The House committee has said it wanted the tax information to review how the IRS audits presidents and to assess whether changes to law or procedure were needed. That rationale was accepted by the lower courts, which is why the fight reached the Supreme Court on an emergency basis. The docket shows that on November 1, 2022, Chief Justice John Roberts entered an administrative stay, temporarily pausing the transfer of the records while the court considered the application. ([supremecourt.gov](https://www.supremecourt.gov/docket/docketfiles/html/public/22A362.html))

The stay was not a final ruling on the merits. It simply froze the handoff while the justices weighed the request. The Supreme Court later referred the application to the full court and denied the stay on November 22, 2022, vacating the chief justice’s interim order. ([supremecourt.gov](https://www.supremecourt.gov/docket/docketfiles/html/public/22A362.html))