RACHEL MARTIN, HOST:
President Trump has lost another bid to keep Congress from seeing his financial records. Two House committees have asked Trump's banks to turn over his financial documents. The president sued to keep that from happening. But yesterday, a federal judge in New York said the banks could move forward with the release.
Here's NPR's Jim Zarroli.
JIM ZARROLI, BYLINE: The House Financial Services and Intelligence Committees have been looking into Trump's ties to foreign governments. And they've issued subpoenas to some of the banks that have handled Trump's financial affairs. They include Capital One, and they also include Deutsche Bank, which lent millions of dollars to Trump after his casino bankruptcies when no other bank would.
Trump and his family argued that the subpoenas were too broad and would allow Democrats in Congress to go on a fishing expedition, looking into not just Trump's own records but those of his family and his business.
But in his ruling, Federal Judge Edgardo Ramos said the subpoenas could go through. This was the second ruling against Trump this week. Another federal judge turned down a request by Trump to stop a subpoena of his accounting records.
Laurie Levenson, professor at Loyola Law School says the courts traditionally have given Congress broad leeway to issue subpoenas.
LAURIE LEVENSON: I thought it was a long shot for Trump and his family to try to block these subpoenas. The court clearly said that it's appropriate for Congress, in its oversight responsibilities, to get these financial records. And the court will allow it.
ZARROLI: The committees have said they will wait seven days before enforcing the subpoenas, giving Trump time to appeal the ruling. And his lawyers made clear yesterday they will do so. But Levenson says an appeal isn't likely to be any more successful than the initial lawsuit was.
LEVENSON: I think the strategy by Trump's lawyers is if they can't stop it, at least they can slow it down.
ZARROLI: Meanwhile, Deutsche Bank says it will go along with whatever the courts decide. And it says it's ready to start turning over documents to the House committees anytime.
Jim Zarroli, NPR News. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
