Like us, the San Jose Mercury News is incredulous that Meg Whitman challenged other candidates to release their taxes and then refused to do it herself. The paper notes that of any candidate in the race, Whitman should release her returns because “she’s buying the Republican nomination for governor, and voters have a right to know how she got her money.”
Editorial: Whitman especially should release tax returns
If any candidate should release tax returns, it’s Meg Whitman. She’s buying the Republican nomination for governor, and voters have a right to know how she got her money.
As to her offer to release summaries of returns instead of the real thing: Oh, please. A campaign-sanitized snapshot won’t tell voters anything she doesn’t want them to know.
The Mercury News asked gubernatorial candidates to release 10 years of tax returns. Whitman went us one better and offered to release 25 years if her opponents, Republican Steve Poizner and Jerry Brown, the Democratic standard-bearer, would do the same. They agreed. Then on Tuesday, Whitman shifted to the summary idea.
Brown says he’ll release everything, just removing Social Security numbers and other openings to identity theft.
Whitman’s clumsy reversal may help explain why she has been so carefully packaged and scripted, only recently beginning to talk to the press.
