Lawyers with the office of New York County District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. on Thursday urged a federal judge to turn back a challenge to a grand jury subpoena seeking President Donald Trump's tax returns from his personal accounting firm.

Vance's office fired back at the position taken by the U.S. Department of Justice, arguing the case is ready to be decided on the merits, one day after U.S. Justice Department lawyers filed papers urging deliberate consideration of Trump's claims in a suit over his subpoenaed tax returns.

In a letter to U.S. Senior District Judge Victor Marrero of the Southern District of New York, the district attorney's general counsel Carey Dunne criticized the Justice Department for getting involved in the case and said its filing "ignores the reality underlying (Trump's) lawsuit."

The Manhattan DA's office argued that Marrero should dismiss the suit because Trump should have filed his complaint in state court and not in the Southern District of New York. Support for Trump's choice of forum was a main point in the Justice Department's filing Thursday.

Dunne accused the  Justice Department of joining Trump's lawyers in an attempt to "obtain as much delay as possible, through litigation, stays and appeals."

He wrote that the Justice Department letter "avoids taking any position on the ultimate merits" of Trump's case. In an argument to avoid further delays, Dunne argued that the merits "have been, at this point, fully briefed and argued."

A spokesperson for the Justice Department declined to comment Thursday.

Trump sued Vance Sept. 19 in response to an August grand jury subpoena for eight years of his tax returns, which was delivered to Trump's accounting firm, Mazars USA.

While the exact issues under investigation by the grand jury are not publicly known, lawyers with the Manhattan DA's office have said they're particularly concerned about delay because statute of limitation expiration dates are coming up for some matters under investigation.

A deadline in the subpoena lawsuit is coming up Monday. Vance's office agreed not to enforce the subpoena until 1 p.m. Oct. 7 or 1 p.m. the day that falls two business days after Marrero rules on pending motions, whichever is sooner.

Mazars agreed to gather and prepare documents in the meantime, according to a letter submitted to Marrero, and the firm plans to make its first delivery of documents in person at 4 p.m. the day the agreement ends, unless Marrero orders otherwise.

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