Donald Trump may owe IRS over $100m after double-dipping on tax claims

Former US President Donald Trump could owe the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) more than $100 million after claiming questionable tax breaks on his skyscraper in Chicago, a thunderclap New York Times (NYT) news report suggested Saturday.

The Chicago Tower — Trump’s most recent major construction project that was completed in 2009 — has been bleeding money since the beginning.

But the IRS, as per the NYT report, is accusing Trump of writing off his losses twice — effectively double dipping on the tax benefits gained from the tower’s financial losses.

The paper reported that Trump’s tax return in 2008 claimed that the building was “worthless” because the debt was too huge to ever turn a profit. 

He reported losses of up to $651 million, according to the NYT’s investigation which it did in collaboration with ProPublica.

In 2010, according to the report, Trump moved the company that owned the tower into a new partnership.

“Because he controlled both companies, it was like moving coins from one pocket to another,” the NYT reported.

“Then he used the shift as justification to declare $168 million in additional losses over the next decade.”

The action has been subject to a years-long, but yet unknown, probe by the IRS that is still underway.