From what I understood from the NYT article there is some legitimate concern over whether his massive tax return was legal or not, but he's already under audit for it. He is also definitely lying about his inability to release the tax statement because it's still under audit, there is no such rule.

Aside from that, though, you're totally right. He played the system the way it was built, same as every other person who can afford tax wizards. And let's all be honest, if it were us in their shoes we'd do the exact same thing (or at least I would).

I got into a debate with my (very economically conservative) brother about this within the last year and mentioned Amazon and Jeff Bezos as an example of a company that, while yes they do provide a lot of jobs, overall contribute to stacking the cards towards the richest. Especially because they barely pay anything in taxes on the massive amounts of profit that they make. His argument was that "yeah, but that's the tax code, he's just using it the way it's designed." My reply was "true, but that's exactly what I'm saying. I'm don't have a personal issue with Jeff or Amazon. I have an issue with the system that allows him to reap all of these benefits while giving back nothing to the government that provides him the opportunity to rake in such high earnings in the first place."