COURTS/DEMS/HOUSE OF REPS/INVESTIGATIONS/TRUMP TAXES: “President Trump’s accounting firm must comply with a House committee’s demands for eight years of his financial records, a federal appeals court panel ruled on Friday [10-11-19] in a major victory for House Democrats in their struggle against his vow to stonewall ‘all’ of their oversight subpoenas. In a 66-page ruling, the panel rejected Mr. Trump’s argument that Congress had no legitimate legislative authority to seek his business records from the firm, Mazars USA, because the committee was trying to determine whether he broke existing laws — not weighing whether to enact a new one…Mr. Trump is virtually certain to appeal the ruling, either to the full Court of Appeals or to the Supreme Court. But the decision — affirming an earlier ruling by a Federal District Court judge — was the first test at the appeals court level of the Trump legal team’s sweeping challenges to the constitutional authority of Congress to conduct oversight of his activities.”
–Charlie Savage, “Congress Can Seek Trump’s Financial Records, Appeals Court Rules,” The New York Times online, October 11, 2019