Heinz Kerry delays filing 2003 tax forms

HOUSTON -- Teresa Heinz Kerry has filed for an extension on her 2003 US income tax forms, giving her husband John F. Kerry's presidential campaign until mid-August to decide whether to make her tax records public, as some Republicans and newspaper editorial boards have demanded.

Campaign spokeswoman Stephanie Cutter said yesterday that Heinz Kerry's tax returns, whenever they are filed, would not be made public, because she is a private citizen who is under no requirement to do so. Yet in recent days, some campaign aides have discussed among themselves whether to release the records in order to settle questions raised by Republicans and in the media about whether her considerable wealth -- estimated at about $500 million, from the ketchup fortune of her late husband John Heinz -- is benefiting Kerry or his campaign in ways that would not be apparent from his tax returns.

Speaking to reporters in Beverly Hills, Calif., yesterday, Heinz Kerry said she did not want to make her tax returns public because it would violate the privacy of her three sons. "If some god of taxes would want to come in and look at all of my portfolio, I'd let them," she said. "But I don't think I have the right to put my children's privacy out into the open."

Heinz Kerry already provides information about her personal finances on Senate ethics disclosure forms. Presidential candidates are not required to disclose their tax records, but almost all do so. Politicians' spouses who file taxes separately rarely face pressure to make returns public.

According to the Internal Revenue Service website, the automatic extension is for four months, which would mean that Heinz Kerry could file her returns anytime between now and mid-August. If she waits until then, it would be after the Democratic National Convention, in late July, and at a time when many Americans will be tuning into the televised 2004 Summer Olympic Games or are possibly on vacation.

Officials with the Bush campaign and the Republican National Committee declined to comment about Heinz Kerry's tax returns yesterday.

One political analyst, Larry Sabato at the University of Virginia, dismissed the matter as a silly distraction from key issues like national and economic security.

"Her tax returns are of interest to a very limited group of people -- almost entirely people backing Bush already," Sabato said. "Whether Teresa Heinz Kerry owns three-quarters of Japan, it just doesn't matter in this election."

Patrick Healy can be reached at phealy@globe.com.