Trump news: President hints he will shut down asylum process during California border visit

President Trump came out with one of his very wildest claims earlier this week when he suggested the noise from windmills causes cancer.

America is still digesting this perplexing - and totally groundless - idea, but rapper and fellow New Jack Hustler Ice-T spoke for a nation when he tweeted the following last night.

The White House yesterday branded Democratic efforts to obtain Donald Trump's tax records "political games." 

The House Ways and Means Committee formally asked the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to provide six years of Trump's personal tax returns and the returns for some of his businesses on Wednesday as Democrats try to shed light on his complex financial dealings and potential conflicts of interest. 

The request by chairman Richard Neal is the first such demand for a sitting president's tax information in 45 years. The unprecedented move is likely to set off a huge legal battle between Democrats controlling the House and the Trump administration. 

Neal made the request in a letter to IRS commissioner Charles Rettig, asking for Trump's personal and business returns for 2013 through 2018. He asked for the documents in seven days, setting a 10 April deadline. 

Trump told reporters on Wednesday he "would not be inclined" to provide his tax returns to the committee. White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said on Thursday morning that the White House "is not interested in playing a bunch of political games like the Democrats in Congress clearly want to spend their time doing." 

Asked again later Thursday for his response to Neal's demand, Trump didn't provide a direct answer. 

"They'll speak to my lawyers; they'll speak to the attorney-general," he said at the White House.

Democrats insist that obtaining Trump's tax filings falls within their mandate of congressional oversight. Republicans have denounced it as a political witch hunt and invoked privacy concerns. 

"We have completed the necessary groundwork for a request of this magnitude, and I am certain we are within our legitimate legislative, legal and oversight rights," Neal said in a statement on Wednesday evening. 

Representative Kevin Brady of Texas, the senior Republican on the Ways and Means panel, denounced the move as "an abuse of the tax-writing committees' statutory authority." 

"Weaponising our nation's tax code by targeting political foes sets a dangerous precedent and weakens Americans' privacy rights," Brady wrote in a letter Wednesday to Treasury secretary Steve Mnuchin, who oversees the IRS. "As you know, by law all Americans have a fundamental right to the privacy of the personal information found in their tax returns." 

Louisiana Republican Steve Scalise said "a lot of Americans are shocked" that Congress can review tax returns, "whether it's a blue collar worker or president of the United States." 

The legal battle set to ensue could take years to resolve, possibly stretching beyond the 2020 presidential election.

Trump broke with decades of tradition for presidential candidates by refusing to release his income tax filings during his 2016 campaign. 

He has said he won't release them because he is being audited, even though IRS officials have said taxpayers under audit are free to release their returns. Trump claimed at a news conference following the November election that the filings are too complex for people to understand. 

The IRS has a policy of auditing the tax returns of all sitting presidents and vice presidents, "yet little is known about the effectiveness of this programme," Richard Neal said in the statement. "On behalf of the American people, the Ways and Means Committee must determine if that policy is being followed, and if so, whether these audits are conducted fully and appropriately." 

He continued, "In order to fairly make that determination, we must obtain President Trump's tax returns and review whether the IRS is carrying out its responsibilities." 

Neal is one of only three congressional officials authorised to make a written request to the Treasury secretary for anyone's tax returns. The IRS is part of the Treasury Department. A rarely used 1924 law says the Treasury chief "shall furnish" the requested material to members of the Ways and Means Committee for them to examine behind closed doors. 

Mnuchin suggested in testimony to Congress last month that he would protect Trump's privacy if the House Democrats requested his tax returns. "We will examine the request and we will follow the law... and we will protect the president as we would protect any taxpayer" regarding their right to privacy, Mnuchin said. 

Boston Red Sox pitcher Hector Velazquez said on Wednesday he would opt out of the team's planned trip to the White House because of Donald Trump's previous comments about Mexico.

"I made the choice not to go because, as we know, the president has said a lot of stuff about Mexico," Velazquez said.

"And I have a lot of people in Mexico that are fans of me, that follow me. And I'm from there. So I would rather not offend anyone over there."

The Cable Guy used another TV show analogy during his meeting with Chinese vice-premier Liu He at the White House yesterday.

For a man who decries "Fake News" so much, he really seems to prefer his reality filtered through fiction. 

Given the president's close ties with Fox News, let's see what they're up to on this bright and brisk morning.

Aha. Being awful about climate change, it seems.

President Trump's response to Joe Biden's apology video was extremely childish and in staggeringly poor taste.

Here's what a grown-up has to say about a man by no means above criticism for his past behaviour.

Remember Herman Cain?

The 73-year-old is one of President Trump's picks for a position on the Federal Reserve's interest rate setting panel.

He is a former executive at Burger King and CEO of Godfather's Pizza, who ran unsuccessfully for the Republican presidential nomination in 2012, losing out to Mitt Romney after his campaign was derailed by five allegations of sexual harassment, all of which he denied.

He also, it transpires, runs a political fundraising group that has spent more than half its money supporting Trump's re-election.

Cain's America Fighting Back PAC is a political action committee created "by a group of President Trump's most committed supporters," according to the group's website. Its mission is to fight "disrespectful, dishonest and destructive news" about Trump and bolster a movement of voters to fight for his reelection in 2020.

America Fighting Back PAC has raised $347,000 (£266,000) during the current election cycle, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. At least $190,500 (£146,000) of that has gone to Canton, Ohio-based RRTV Media for television advertising in support of Trump, filings with the Federal Election Commission show. The total includes $10,000 (£7,655) just weeks before Cain met with Trump to discuss the Fed job on 30 January and another $9,000 (£6,890) in early March.

Cain appears to be the only one of Trump's Fed nominees so far to have actively raised funds for his benefit and has not personally made any contributions to Trump's campaign.

Trump's plan to nominate an overt loyalist for a spot on the Fed board comes after he has over and over again lambasted the central bank for raising interest rates four times last year and could checker the Fed's long-cherished standing as an independent, apolitical body.

Trump's social media director and former caddy Dan Scavino is "owning the libs" with a montage looking back on 2016 set to Grieg's "In the Hall of the Mountain King" from Peer Gynt.

He must have heard it in a movie or something.

The president's cartoonish lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, is attacking his predecessor Michael Cohen again.