Of all the transgressions that Donald Trump's supporters willingly overlook — the misogyny, the xenophobia, the religious and ethnic prejudice, etc., etc. — the most surprising is his financial finagling.

The New York Times reported this week that Trump's own tax advisers had advised him against trying to claim $916 million in losses on his casino operations on his 1995 tax return. This wasn't Trump's money. It was money lent to him by investors on projects that went sour. And yet Trump declared $916 million in personal losses, a dubiously legal trick that he boasts offset his income taxes for the next 18 years.

When the Times asked Hope Hicks, Trump's campaign press secretary, for a response, she criticized the complexity of the U.S. tax code that her boss had exploited and said, "Mr. Trump does not think that taxpayers should file returns that resolve all doubt in favor of the IRS."

This is not about the IRS. The IRS just collects taxes. It's the American people who must cover the loss. Every dollar in taxes that Trump doesn't pay — and there have been millions — is a dollar that must be paid by less exalted American taxpayers. The bondholders and contractors whom he stiffs are business people who take personal hits.

And yet Trump's supporters, heavily weighted to white working-class Americans, are willing to overlook his tax-system abuses. They want a strong national defense, job training, border security and old-age benefits. They pay their taxes for that. Trump doesn't. He's not the solution; he's the problem.

They're being played for suckers. Bill and Hillary Clinton paid an effective state, local and federal tax rate of 43.2 percent last year and gave 9.8 percent of their adjusted gross income to charity, yet she's the candidate they don't trust.

Trump's own charitable giving has been shown to be a sham. He hasn't released his own tax returns, breaking a 40-year tradition by presidential candidates of both parties. His excuse is that he's still under audit, but the IRS says an audit shouldn't prevent anyone from releasing his or her returns. An audit is well-deserved, and we hope there's still time for the IRS to recover some of money he owes the rest of America.

The gimmick that Trump used to declare that $916 million in losses on his 1995 return has since been outlawed by Congress. He converted debt to "equity partnerships," even though his creditors were buying into worthless entities. Regardless, canceled debt constitutes a form of income that must be reported.

The American experiment only works when we trust each other to do the right thing, and because authorities enforce that trust. Trump's standard is: Whatever you can get away with is OK.

That's wrong. That's dangerous. That's un-American.