Republican Presidential candidate Newt Gingrich released his income tax returns as pressure mounted on rival candidate Mitt Romney to do the same.
The former Speaker of the House released his and his wife Callista’s joint federal income tax return for 2010 on Thursday evening, shortly before a debate among the remaining candidates. Gingrich also released the tax return for the Gingrich Foundation, his Section 501(c)3 tax-exempt private foundation.
The Gingriches’
Included in the wage and salary income reported on Gingrich and his wife’s tax return was $450,245 in combined wages; $41,625 in income from speaking and board of directors fees; $6,853 in rental income from real estate holdings; $11,892 in ordinary dividends; $5,990 in qualified dividends; and $2,525,683 in income from partnerships and S corporations, including the Lubbers Agency Inc. and Gingrich Holdings Inc.
For the year 2010, the Speaker and Mrs. Gingrich reported $4,184 in net short-term capital gains and $32,541 in net long-term capital losses. Over the course of the year, the couple also contributed $81,133 to various charities, including the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception.
The
“I obviously pay all full taxes,” said Gingrich during the CNN-sponsored debate in Charleston, S.C. “I’m honest in my dealings with people. People understand that. My taxes are carefully managed. And I pay a lot of taxes. I've been very successful.”
At the same debate, Gingrich’s rival, Mitt Romney indicated that he would probably release multiple years of his tax returns, but declined to say how many.
“When my taxes are complete for this year, and I know that if I’m the nominee, the President is going to want to insist that I show what my income was this last year, so when they’re completed this year in April, I will release my returns in April for his year, and probably for other years as well,” Romney said.
Romney was reminded that his father George Romney had released 12 years’ worth of tax returns in 1967 when he was running for the presidency, but the Republican front-runner was noncommittal.
“I don’t know how many years I’ll release,” he said. “I’ll release multiple years, I don’t know how many years, but I’ll be happy to do that. I know there are some who are anxious to see if they can make it difficult for a campaign to be successful. I know the Democrats want to go after my being successful. I’m not going to apologize for being successful.”
Pressure has been growing on Romney to release his tax returns after he had earlier indicated that he would not release them (see
Romney’s net worth is estimated to be over $250 million, while Gingrich has a net worth of over $6.5 million.