The Chicago Sun-Times reports:
For the past six years, Cook County tax officials mistakenly believed billionaire Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee for president, didn’t pay all the property taxes owed on his namesake Chicago skyscraper, shorting schools and other government agencies.
They were wrong.
They thought Trump had failed to pay a nearly $2.4 million tax bill in 2010 — a bill that had ballooned to nearly $4.7 million this year, including penalties and interest.
But property-tax records for the Trump International Hotel & Tower examined by the Chicago Sun-Times showed county tax officials had miscalculated Trump’s 2010 bill.
The main reason? A last-minute tax cut Trump got after his attorney, Ald. Edward M. Burke (14th), persuaded the county assessor to slash the tower’s value by more than 70 percent, the Sun-Times found.
In fact, county tax officials now agree, Trump paid all of his property taxes in full. They are moving to erase the erroneous tax delinquency that has been on their books for years.
But the Sun-Times also found that county officials mistakenly gave Trump a $23,649 refund on taxes he paid in 2010. They say Trump needs to repay that.
“This error was only discovered last week when a local reporter submitted a . . . request for all the tax records for the property,” according to a written statement from Cook County Treasurer Maria Pappas’ office.
Trump’s tax mess illustrates the complexities of a Cook County property tax system that’s overseen by political leaders and influenced by insiders like Burke, the powerful alderman and Democratic Party ward boss.
There's more:
Burke is now asking Cook County judges to cut Trump’s property taxes even more.Any doubt who's running things in Chicago? Guess who picks all the judges in Cook County??? None other than Alderman Ed Burke. Here's more on the man Donald Trump calls for his one stop shopping of his "Chicago problems." Here's how Alderman Ed Burke "rose" to the top.
