Assange Says Wikileaks is 'Working On' Hacking Donald Trump's Tax Return (slate.com)

Julian Assange made headlines Friday when talk-show host Bill Maher asked him why Wikileaks wasn't hacking into Donald's Trump's tax returns. "Well, we're working on it," Assange replied. But it was apparently the culmination of a larger back-and-forth. An anonymous reader quotes Slate: Earlier in the interview, Maher said it sure looked like Assange was "working with a bad actor, Russia" to hurt "the one person who stands in the way of us being ruled by Donald Trump." Assange then tried to move the conversation toward what he thought was a smoking gun against Maher, saying he had found there was a "William Maher" who "gave a Clinton-affiliated entity $1 million." Maher explained he had famously given President Obama $1 million in 2012 and he never tried to hide it. When Assange pressed on whether he had also given money to Clinton, Maher shot back: "Fuck no."
Slate has a video of the entire interview, and while Friday WikiLeaks was publicizing Assange's appearance on the show on Twitter, Saturday they were tweeting a clarification. "WikiLeaks isn't 'working on' hacking Trump's tax-returns. Claim is a joke from a comedy show. We are 'working on' encouraging whistleblowers."

Comments

So the tax returns aren't public?

[Z00L00K]

So the tax returns aren't available to the public already?

Re: So the tax returns aren't public?

[Anonymous Coward]

Donald Trump has a right to keep his tax returns private. Nobody has a right to hack into a system to obtain them. As former President Bill Clinton said after Republicans impeached him, "even presidents have private lives." If you don't like Trump keeping his tax returns private, you're free to vote for someone else. However, you don't have a right to see his tax return without his consent. I don't like Trump, but I completely support him standing up for his privacy on this issue.

Re: So the tax returns aren't public?

[Anonymous Coward]

If he didn't have such a scandalous history I might agree, but this is someone running for president who filed for bankruptcy as recently as 2009. I'm pretty sure he has already asked Obama to present his.

Re: So the tax returns aren't public?

[ScentCone]

You're confusing personal bankruptcy with one of many businesses doing so. Those are not the same thing. The businesses file their own taxes. Any business that isn't a pass-through LLC has to. If someone owns a bunch of business entities, and one or several of them fail to the point where bankruptcy protection is involved, then there are public records involved - because the matter goes before a court. Which doesn't have much to do with the personal income taxes of the person (or one of the people) who owned shares of that company.

If you really want scandalous, pay attention to the giant money-laundering operation that is the Clinton Foundation.

Re: So the tax returns aren't public?

[Anonymous Coward]

If he didn't have such a scandalous history I might agree, but this is someone running for president who filed for bankruptcy as recently as 2009. I'm pretty sure he has already asked Obama to present his.

I want Trump to lose, if only to prevent all the damage he could do, but I have to agree that he is not required by law to release them. Ethically he should, since this is the single most important job interview anyone can ever get, and it has material information that is required for the background check, but practically, at some point you have to trust the voters to see through the obvious lies.

Is he as rich as he says he is? That is almost certainly false. Forbes agreed he was probably a billionaire, but at least half if not more was lies.

Is their something really bad in those tax returns? Perhaps. Perhaps not. I truly believe he values his image more than the presidency or serving the
American people. If hiding those returns protects his image, then I think he is willing to pay any price for that.

Does he believe the stuff he says about Hillary? That answer is an obvious no, since he said the opposite when prior to becoming a candidate?

Does he care about the country? Perhaps on some level, but I rather suspect he cares about himself more.

Is he a republican? From what I can tell no. Nor is he a democrat. He is basically a con man/flim flam artist/etc etc. He says whatever he thinks people want to hear, seemingly having few consistent principles beyond his brand, and to some extent his family.

Is he stable enough not to start a nuclear war? Probably. Even with the money from daddy, it still takes a certain amount of discipline not to lose it all. He is not stupid. No I think the damage he would do would be in other ways. He has publicly talked about abandoning allies. There is, however, a chance he would see striking back with a nuclear weapon as being bold and decisive, completely ignoring the clusterf*ck opening that can of worse would cause.

Those are my opinions. Voters can create their own. They should not need to see his tax returns at this point to smell the rotting fish. If Trump somehow manages to win then we will get the government we deserve. Heaven help us if that does occur...

Re: So the tax returns aren't public?

[covalamin]

No one believes an anonymous coward! Post with your main account if you want to have a n intelligent discussion. Anyway, your main reason for voting for the other guy is wrong. Trump would be prevented from doing much of anything by the House and Senate. Hillary is the one who could do some damage .... or maybe some good. Thus the question is do you really believe Hillary is going to do more good than harm? Personally, I'd rather have a phony outsider who has a love for his country than a corrupt politician who has repeatedly turned their back on Americans.

Re:So the tax returns aren't public?

[Rei]

Meh, learn to store all your money in Panama like we do over here in Iceland ;)

Re:So the tax returns aren't public?

[Actually, I do RTFA]

Every Republican nominee since Nixon has made his tax returns public.

Re:So the tax returns aren't public?

[tlhIngan]

Trump has refused to show his returns until after he is elected. Could be he has something to hide or could be he just doesn't want people to know he details should he lose. Difficult to be sure!

Well, the problem is D. Trump is apparently a terrible businessman - most of his businesses have failed. Excepting his corporate raider tactics on existing companies and cashing in on celebrity status, none of his ventures have made money. He's worth less today than in the past. He's riding the family fortunes to the ground. Luckily for him, there's a lot of it.

Well, slight correction, apparently his Russian businesses are quite profitable, if you ever wondered where the love for him in Russia comes from.

So there's that - people *assume* he's a good businessman simply because everyone has hear about him. (His flashy plane and other things also help advertise him). The truth is different, and hiding the tax returns is one way to prevent people from knowing it.

In the end, the real irony is when people talked about celebrity presidents, everyone assumed it would be something like a Kardashian or Justin Bieber or other entertainment celebrity. Trump IS a celebrity, except aimed at the more general voter base. So there you have it - the beginning of change in US politices from lying and cheating politicians to celebrities. Maybe in 10 years there really will be Kardashians running, when all those people grow up and become a solid voting bloc.

Re:So the tax returns aren't public?

[Z00L00K]

Same in Sweden.

Re: So the tax returns aren't public?

[jellomizer]

More to the point what information could you find in his tax returns that would sway people from voting for him?

You should know that the wealthy look rich to the shareholders and poor to the government. So his tax returns are not going to look stellar. We know this. This is why rich people are always under audit because his wealth is a disconnect to his taxable income so the irs will terming if any errors were done or laws broken. To be fair the tax code is so complex that the rich has the resources to abuse it without breaking laws.

Just because this election time we have Hillary Clinton who comes with her own political baggage and many people going I'll never vote for her no matter what. Gives Trump the only advantage. As he wasn't considered a political treat for 24 years. Allowing conservative media to dig up dirt of any type to go against her.

So now we have to vote for the corrupted or the corrupter.

Re: So the tax returns aren't public?

[ThatsMyNick]

You know you can leave on your own, without the US kicking you out right? Just leave. Have fun, we wont miss you.

Re: So the tax returns aren't public?

[reboot246]

The posters here are also confusing wealth with income. His tax returns will show how much he makes per year (income), not how much he owns (wealth).

Some posters are also exaggerating how many bankruptcies he's had. Even CNN reports exactly FOUR, not six, not seventeen, not dozens. If you take the risks and start a lot of companies, a few are going to fail. That's just part of business. Only the government can get away with failing over and over and over.

Re:So the tax returns aren't public?

[Actually, I do RTFA]

Well, Nixon's tax avoidance/evasion is the reason why the tradition evolved. He was the first president(al candidate) to do so, albeit after he was elected.

Also, his "I am not a crook" line was about his tax issues, not Watergate.

Re: So the tax returns aren't public?

[Anonymous Coward]

Romney released a single year of his tax returns, and that was only after considerable pressure from the left. Do not try to pretend that Republican candidates are some kind of bastion of transparency.

The Clintons have released their tax returns dating back to 1977 -- 40 years worth -- and have always been open with the information (ie: they were releasing this information publicly back when Bill Clinton was running for presidency).

So, Trump, where are your tax returns?

Re: So the tax returns aren't public?

[fustakrakich]

No one believes a pseudo anonymous coward! Post with your real name and address if you want to have an intelligent discussion.

Re: So the tax returns aren't public?

[ITRambo]

I'm more concerned about Hillary's current inability to continually focus for long periods of time during campaign speeches. Maybe she's tired. But there are recent videos of her speeches where she just freezes up and needs to be nudged to continue talking. The long brain farts scare me more than whether she's corrupt or not.

Re: So the tax returns aren't public?

[magarity]

Trump's name is on a bunch of casinos but he strategy is to build them and sell fairly promptly. He owns a lot less than the branding suggests.

Re: So the tax returns aren't public?

[Mashiki]

You know the federalist, NYT, WAPO and Bloomburg have all covered this and found it was true right? This is kinda the short summary on the entire thing.

Re:So the tax returns aren't public?

[Enigma2175]

The thing is if you start 20 businesses and 17 of them go bankrupt, you are still doing ok as a businessman.

Most businesses have, regardless of who started them, failed. The majority of those failures occur within the very first year of operation. Thats what average looks like.

While all businesses do fail eventually (over the timespan of "forever", it's hard not to eventually fail), but it's certainly not in the first year. Most small businesses fail just because they are not worth anything to someone else. When the owner of a small business dies or retires, his business usually fails -- because nobody wants to pay money to buy "Henry Adelson Landscaping" when they can just start their own landscaping company. From a Washington Post Article on the subject:

As far as we can tell, there is no statistical basis for the assertion that nine out of 10 businesses fail. It appears to be one of those nonsense facts that people repeat without thinking too clearly about it.
...

About half of all new establishments survive five years or more and about one-third survive 10 years or more. As one would expect, the probability of survival increases with a firm’s age. Survival rates have changed little over time.

Donald Trump's bankruptcies are the classic "heads I win, tails you lose" scam. If the building project does well, he makes a bunch of money. If it doesn't, he just has the development company declare bankruptcy and all the subcontractors and suppliers that provided the labor and supplies to build the project get screwed.

Re: So the tax returns aren't public?

[fustakrakich]

you have no idea if it is the original coward or a different coward.

So what? Don't use the messenger as a distraction and a cop out. Reply to the message, not the person.

Re:So the tax returns aren't public?

[JBMcB]

I suppose that's the norm for him, but there's no legitimate reason why he can't provide them. He doesn't want to. that's the sole reason. Which leads to the question why he doesn't.

Because he's under audit. There's no law stopping him from doing so, but, from a legal standpoint, it's a really bad idea.

http://www.npr.org/2016/02/26/...

Basically, if someone he does business with is disgruntled, they can pull up his tax information, find some line item they are somewhat familiar with and tell the IRS he's lying. Then the IRS is obligated to do more investigation into that area of his tax return. The claim could be completely bogus, made anonymously, but it will still hold up the audit while the IRS does it's due diligence.

Now, when you're talking about a controversial presidential candidate, you *really* don't want to release anything. Nutjobs would be coming out of the woodwork making claims about his tax returns. The IRS would be obligated to follow up on all of them.

Normally this isn't an issue, as there would be no reason to release your returns. Slightly different situation when you are running for president.

I can see valid arguments on both sides of the issue. Personally I don't care, but I could see how you could.

Re: So the tax returns aren't public?

[fahrbot-bot]

More to the point what information could you find in his tax returns that would sway people from voting for him?

Most likely that his Returns won't portray him in the same light as he's been shining on himself. But, that's really only a problem for the naive. From Trump Admits That He Will Lose The Election If He Releases His Tax Returns (and other places):

Trump admitted that there is something in his tax returns that will cause him to lose the election. His reference to his own belief that something in Romney’s tax return cost Republicans in 2012 was about as close to an admission as voters are going to get from Trump.

Donald Trump defended his tax returns as legal, but that doesn’t mean that it’s right. What Trump is most likely hiding is the fact that he hasn’t paid any personal income taxes for decades. Trump isn’t paying his fair share of taxes. That is what he is hiding. Donald Trump is trying to pass himself off as some sort of blue-collar billionaire while he is manipulating the system in a way that no working class American ever could.

For more info: trump romney tax returns

Re:So the tax returns aren't public?

[mschwanke97402]

Now, when you're talking about a controversial presidential candidate, you *really* don't want to release anything. Nutjobs would be coming out of the woodwork making claims about his tax returns. The IRS would be obligated to follow up on all of them.

No, only a presidential candidate who has played fast and loose with contractual obligations as a routine business practice need worry about reasonable people, who've been cheated by the candidate, need worry.

Maher is an idiot

[93 Escort Wagon]

Look, I really dislike The Donald... but the president doesn't "rule" us.

Re:Maher is an idiot

[ChrisMaple]

The whole essence of the United States constitution is that the government doesn't rule us. That Bill Maher thinks it should is an indication of how corrupt his mind is.

Re:Maher is an idiot

[Bing Tsher E]

Maher is just a television performer. His big show was a comedy revue on a network that primarily airs comedy programs.

Re:Maher is an idiot

[I'm New Around Here]

Pretty sure Maher intended that Trump expects to "rule" over us, regardless of what the position of the presidency is supposed to do. Trump has made it abundantly clear from his promises and bullshit that he doesn't understand the jurisdiction of the role. And what do you think will happen if Trump does win and realize that he doesn't get to sit up on high and dictate legislature? After a temper-tantrum he'll probably start massive public smear campaigns against any legislator who doesn't immediately toe his line.

So it will be Obama's third term?

Because that is exactly how President Obama has acted for the last 7+ years.

Encouraging Whistleblowers?

[SeattleLawGuy]

A whistleblower is a person who publicizes information his employer or another entity with which he is affiliated does not want published, out of a desire to accomplish meaningful institutional reform.

Employees who hack you on behalf of their rival company or rival nation are not whistleblowers. They are thugs who think it will be useful if they knock you down and take your briefcase.

Re:Encouraging Whistleblowers?

[Antique Geekmeister]

> A whistleblower is a person who publicizes information his employer or another entity with which he is affiliated does not want published,

Please allow me to differ on this matter. Many "whistleblowers" are political opponents of the people or entities they report on, and go to considerable effort or even encounter danger to expose the behavior. This is also what good reporters do, and it's why Woodward and Bernstein received a Pulitzer Prize for revealing the "Watergate Papers".

Hacking

[Dog-Cow]

So Wikileaks has gone from technically illegal activity to morally-wrong activity?

A tax return is not like memos of secret negotiations or illegal spy activities. It is a document filed by a private citizen with its government. There is absolutely no moral ground to insisting it be provided to the public.

Re:Hacking

[ScentCone]

Where I live, tax returns are a matter of public record. Please provide a moral justification for treating them in any other fashion.

Because your personal choices about business dealings, charitable donations, what sort of bonuses you might give to your personal assistant or landscaper, and a thousand other things are private and can be kept that way if you choose to do so. Why should, for example, a business competitor get to be able to go over your personal tax return and figure out which new businesses or activities you're investing in? Why should the public get to know what sort of interest rate you got on your home loan, or which medical procedures you're paying for? That you're so used to your government making all of those things public that you can't understand why it's intrusive is pretty unsettling, actually. I feel sorry for your fellow citizens, whichever Orwellian nation it is you're living in.

Re:Hacking

[phantomfive]

So Wikileaks has gone from technically illegal

I don't think they've done anything illegal in the jurisdictions where they live (although Assange probably did illegal things unrelated to Wikileaks).

It is a document filed by a private citizen with its government.

He doesn't want to be a private citizen.

Re:Hacking

[Dog-Cow]

I don't think anyone should have to provide a moral justification for keeping any data private. Privacy should be the default position, and there should be a moral justification for making anything public.

There is no public good served by making a tax return public information.

Re: Hacking

[Dog-Cow]

Not that I agree that Obama should (have) release(d) his birth certificate, but at least a birth certificate is relevant to one's legal suitability to be POTUS, in so far as it documents one of the requirements for the office.

Re:Hacking

[quantaman]

So Wikileaks has gone from technically illegal activity to morally-wrong activity?

A tax return is not like memos of secret negotiations or illegal spy activities. It is a document filed by a private citizen with its government. There is absolutely no moral ground to insisting it be provided to the public.

And Assange exposing what he thought was a private donation by Bill Maher?

I found that a bit distasteful, while I can see the public's right to know there's something off about trying to shame someone by surprising them with illicitly obtained private information.

Either way I think the big issue with Wikileaks and the DNC emails is they weren't a leak, they were a hack.

For a leak you need an insider who thinks things are so wrong that they're willing to risk their career, and even jail time, by leaking the information. It's a very random happenstance and tends to happen only when things are particularly bad.

But hacks tend to favour the more powerful entities (like Russia) who can dispatch sophisticated technical resources against their enemies. You don't need a massive egregious wrong, if you have an enemy you just need to hack their servers and go digging until you find bad. Russia didn't leak the DNC emails because the Democratic party was favouring Clinton, they leaked them because they were looking for anything to damage Clinton.

Wikileaks has transitioned from an organization that enabled insiders to hold powerful entities responsible to an organization that helps powerful entities attack opponents.

Re:Hacking

[khallow]

And Assange exposing what he thought was a private donation by Bill Maher?

It's a private donation by a public figure who just so happens to have a likely conflict of interest in this interview.

Wikileaks has transitioned from an organization that enabled insiders to hold powerful entities responsible to an organization that helps powerful entities attack opponents.

What's supposed to be bad about that? The alleged opponents in questions are also powerful entities. Looks to me like Wikileaks is holding true to its mission.

Re:Hacking

[poity]

It seemed to me that Assange mentioned Maher's donation as a way to reflect the "impure motivation" red herring back at Maher. Maher had, just a second before that, questioned Assange's motives by saying that he had, through his past dealing with the US government, developed a personal animus towards Clinton. This has been the common attack against Assange from the media in the aftermath of the DNC leak -- it goes like this: Assange's motives are not sufficiently pure, therefore the contents of the DNC email leak, no matter how true, must not be discussed, else we would play into the hands of someone else's agenda. This, of course, is fallacious thinking, and Assange tried to show Maher, through his own example, that a million dollar donation to a Democrat does not and should not cast a shadow upon Maher's brutal and regular take-downs of Republican people and ideas. The truth remains the truth, no matter who speaks it.

And that reminds me of something:

At best, the obscurantist attitude of saying that it is an undesirable document and better suppressed. And if for some reason it were decided to issue a garbled version of the pamphlet, denigrating Trotsky and inserting references to Stalin, no Communist who remained faithful to his party could protest. Forgeries almost as gross as this have been committed in recent years. But the significant thing is not that they happen, but that, even when they are known about, they provoke no reaction from the left-wing intelligentsia as a whole. The argument that to tell the truth would be ‘inopportune’ or would ‘play into the hands of’ somebody or other is felt to be unanswerable, and few people are bothered by the prospect of the lies which they condone getting out of the newspapers and into the history books.

-- George Orwell, The Prevention of Literature

Re:Hacking

[mt2mb4me]

Well, sure, but we don't have to, because they have released their Tax returns every year, faithfully without fuss. So, What are you getting at? That even though the clintons are transparent, republicans still can't get anything to stick on her? Yeah, that sounds right.

Re:Hacking

[wbr1]

Privacy should be the default position - for citizens.

Open access should be the default position for government, be it organizations or elected officials. The moment one chooses to put them selves in a position of governmental power over others by running for office, all data on that individual should be made public.

Re:Hacking

[quantaman]

And Assange exposing what he thought was a private donation by Bill Maher?

It's a private donation by a public figure who just so happens to have a likely conflict of interest in this interview.

I agree it's newsworthy, but in the exchange itself Assange didn't come across as "I think I encountered a major conflict of interest you kept hidden" but "I discovered one of your secrets and I'll use it to destroy you".

Wikileaks has transitioned from an organization that enabled insiders to hold powerful entities responsible to an organization that helps powerful entities attack opponents.

What's supposed to be bad about that?

Don't accept leaks from outside hacks, especially if you believe the hacker has bad motives.

The alleged opponents in questions are also powerful entities. Looks to me like Wikileaks is holding true to its mission.

The problem is that instead of punishing unethical behaviour you're now rewarding it.

The organizations who thrive in the new wikileaks system are the ones unscrupulous enough to hack their rivals and leak their dirty laundry.

Re:Hacking

[fahrbot-bot]

Because your personal choices about business dealings, charitable donations, what sort of bonuses you might give to your personal assistant or landscaper, and a thousand other things are private and can be kept that way if you choose to do so.

However, Trump has made statements about all these things in relation to his character and many (if not most) of these claims have been demonstrated to be, if not outright false, exaggerations. His tax returns are more objective in this regard - which is what concerns Trump.

• Trump promised millions to charity. We found less than $10,000 over 7 years.
• Five questions we still can’t answer about Donald Trump’s charity donations
• Four months after fundraiser, Trump says he gave $1 million to veterans group

More info: trump charitable donation

Re:EditorDavid is an ass

[Mashiki]

You're surprised by this? I'm actually astounded at just how much the entire media establishment(US, CAN, UK, EU, etc all the big publications) is against Trump. It's literally frothing at the mouth hate of Trump, and they still don't understand that it's their actions, and the actions of the left that have catapulted him to the top. And these many months in, they still think that this stuff is going to work.

Keep going boys. At this point, I'm hoping for Trump to be elected just to watch your heads explode because your self-fulfilling echo-chambers broke. Maybe then you'll learn what journalism is vs editorials painted as journalism....or the entire media infrastructure will collapse and we'll enter a new era of actual journalists who report on issues neutrally again.

Re:EditorDavid is an ass

[loonycyborg]

It's like with brexit, people will vote for Trump as a form of vote of no confidence to current establishment.

Wikileaks: Propaganda arm of Russian intelligence

[beamdriver]

Everything they and Assange have done pretty much confirms this.

I mean, come on, every day Assange is telling us that he's going to release some new leak about Clinton that's going to lead to her indictment. He's essentially the Russian version of our old friend, The Iraqi Information Minister.

Misleading Headline

[Transist]

Assange said the headline was a joke. Whether he was actually joking at the time of the statement or not is up for debate, but Slashdot is still playing the clickbait/debate-baiting headline game.

Re:Shut down Wikileaks

[sittingnut]

Last I checked, hacking to access private information is . ...

checked where?
there is nothing unethical about revealing information that shows unethical (including criminal) activity. or revealing private information about harmful institutions that engage in criminal activities.

in case of snowden with nsa, and in case of wikileaks with regard to hillary supporting dnc, revealing hidden information was ethical.

of course supporters of evil entities damaged by such revelations will claim such actions are "illegal and unethical"(eg you and maher)

I can't believe so many people are this stupid

[poity]

It's been a decade since Wikileaks captured the public's attention, and most people still don't seem to understand that it's only a publisher that relies on others to provide info. I figured Bill Maher would know better. I figured journalists would know better. But they've all been speculating on the "Why hasn't Wikileaks hacked Trump yet?" question for the past week, as if they didn't know what Wikileaks is about.

Are they all this stupid, or just pretending to be fucking obtuse?

No... they MUST be pretending. Bill Maher has interviewed Assange in the past -- without questioning his motives or insinuating that Assange/Wikileaks exfiltrated secret documents themselves. He has demonstrated in the past that he knows Wikileaks is only a publisher. As well, there have been thousands of articles in the mainstream press since Collateral Murder and Cablegate, and they did not cast Assange/Wikileaks as hackers or to insinuate that they were enemy collaborators. Journalists have demonstrated in the past that they know Wikileaks is only a publisher.

No... they DO know better, I'm certain ALL of them know better. But they're so full of rage that no one has yet leaked Trump's info to Wikileaks while their favorite Clinton is being undermined, they've become the mirror image of the Fox-watching "Fairness and Balance"-demanding trogs that the left so often mocks and derides.

Re:Shut down Wikileaks

[phorm]

"there is nothing unethical about revealing information that shows unethical (including criminal) activity. or revealing private information about harmful institutions that engage in criminal activities"

It might not be, but hacking into somebody because you *think* they may have said information IS unethical. Now if you're provided said information (say as a news agency) and then release it, that's necessarily unethical.