Alex Morse, the mayor of Holyoke, Massachusetts, announced plans to challenge House Ways & Means Chairman Richard Neal in 2020 Monday.
Morse, 30, is being encouraged to run by progressive Democrats who are frustrated by Neal’s delay in obtaining Trump’s state tax returns under the law passed by Democratic New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, NBC News reported.
“There’s an urgency to this moment in Massachusetts’ 1st District and our country, and that urgency is not matched by our current representative in Congress,” Morse said in a video to announce his challenge. (RELATED: This City’s Mayor Is The First To Endorse Pot Legalization Ballot In Massachusetts)
Democrats have been frustrated with Neal, a Massachusetts representative, because he has not pushed for Trump‘s New York state tax returns despite the law. Liberal magazine The American Prospect wrote Neal’s committee “has shown none of the zeal for oversight exhibited by its counterparts.”
US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin (L) shakes hands with Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, Richard Neal, in Washington, DC, on March 14, 2019. (Photo by JIM WATSON/AFP/Getty Images)
“We respect his focus on moving rapidly on health care, tax policy, and pensions but at the same time many of us have tried to express the sense of urgency which we and our constituents feel about enforcing the law and obtaining Trump’s tax returns,” an aide to a Democratic member of the Ways & Means told NBC.
Cuomo signed a bill into law July 8 giving access to Trump’s New York state tax returns to “congressional tax-related committees” if they can cite a “legitimate task” of Congress in seeking them, according to NBC.
Neal said he did not request Trump’s state returns under the law because he doesn’t want to hamper efforts to get Trump’s federal filings, which he is suing the Treasury and IRS to obtain, a process Neal didn’t begin for several months after the new Congress was sworn in.
Neal has also said requesting Trump’s state returns only served to legitimize complaints that Congress sought them for political purposes only, he told Bloomberg News.
“We are fortunate to live in a country where everyone can have his or her voice heard by running for office, and that’s why Congressman Neal will welcome anyone into this race,” Neal spokesman Peter Panos told the Boston Globe. “Richie has been a champion for working families in Western Massachusetts and has fought tirelessly to ensure that the people of our region are not forgotten and receive our fair share.”
Neal’s office did not immediately return requests for comment from the Daily Caller News Foundation.
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