Biden tax returns show income and effective rate fell in 2022

President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden paid $169,820 in federal and state income tax on a combined $579,514 in adjusted gross income, according to their annual tax returns.

Both amounts represented a decrease from the previous year, in which the first family made $610,702 in 2021 and paid $183,925 in taxes. The decline was in part because of increased charitable giving — the Bidens donated slightly more than $20,000 last year — and in part because of falling income from their S-corporations, entities that they have used to run the income from their book deals.

Still, the Bidens’ returns show a largely unchanged financial picture. Their income came primarily from the president’s $400,000 annual salary, as well as the $82,335 that the first lady earned as a professor at Northern Virginia Community College. The couple also received nearly $50,000 in Social Security benefits, and more than $35,000 from pensions and annuities. 

The returns were released by the White House on Tuesday, the deadline for Americans to file tax documents.

The Bidens saw an effective federal tax rate of 23.8% in 2022, down from 24.6% the prior year. They won’t receive a refund this year and instead ended up owing $4,632.

Biden paid $56,194 in state and local taxes, or SALT, but only could deduct $10,000 of that amount because of a cap on the write-off from President Donald Trump’s tax overhaul. Democrats have pushed to increase the deduction, but it’s been politically tricky because it would mean many high earners would get a tax cut.

They paid state taxes in Delaware and Virginia.

The president has proposed increasing taxes on wealthy Americans and corporations, and earlier Tuesday criticized House Speaker Kevin McCarthy for Republican proposals — unveiled during a speech Monday at the New York Stock Exchange — that the White House says would cut government benefits while reducing the tax burden on the affluent.

“He did not tell the wealthy or the powerful on Wall Street that it was finally time for them to start paying their fair share of taxes,” Biden said. “That didn’t come up.”

The White House said in a statement that the 2022 documents were the 25th year of returns the Bidens had made public, more than any president while in office. 

Trump repeatedly refused to disclose his income taxes both during his 2016 presidential campaign and after taking office, and has not done so this year despite announcing his campaign seeking a return to the White House in 2024. Late last year, however, his personal and business filings from 2015 to 2020 were made public after being turned over to a U.S. House committee. 

While returns showed a modest income decrease for the president and first lady, Vice President Kamala Harris and Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff experienced a more dramatic fall last year. The second couple reported a federal adjusted gross income of $456,918 — down from $1,655,563 the previous year. 

The second family’s income in 2021 was inflated by the sale of the vice president’s San Francisco loft, as well as partnership income from the second gentleman’s career working at the law firms DLA Piper and Venable. In 2022, Emhoff banked just under $170,000 from his job as a law professor at Georgetown University.

Harris and her husband, who pay taxes as California residents, racked up an even bigger SALT bill, paying $127,958 in state income and property taxes.

Both the president and vice president gave to charities with personal connections again in 2022. Biden’s donations included a $5,000 gift to the Beau Biden Foundation and contributions to the Roman Catholic church he regularly attends in Delaware. 

The second family donated $5,000 to the vice president’s alma mater, Howard University in Washington, and matching amounts to the University of Southern California, where Emhoff attended college and law school.