The Trump administration refuses to reveal who is getting millions, even billions, of dollars in coronavirus aid from the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP).

Why? Democrats in Congress and good-government advocacy groups are determined to find out.

Treasury Secretary Stephen Mnuchin claims that the names of loan recipients and the amounts disbursed as part of the $600 billion-plus PPP are “proprietary information.”

But Democrats say “there is nothing proprietary or confidential about businesses receiving millions of taxpayer dollars,” reports the Associated Press.

In fact, the PPP application form from the Small Business Administration (SBA) says information about the loans “will be automatically released,” including names of the borrowers, the amount of the loan in question and its purpose.

Mnuchin says recipients of PPP loans are "confidential." SBA's own PPP application form says the exact opposite. What gives? pic.twitter.com/B2B8a9raw3

— Nikhel Sus (@NikhelSus) June 15, 2020

“The apparent decision to withhold loan records is the latest of several actions by the Trump administration that could shield the federal coronavirus response from public scrutiny,” says the Washington Post.

“The PPP was created by the $2.2 trillion coronavirus relief package, known as the CARES Act, that President Trump signed on March 27 and is a key part of policymakers’ efforts to help businesses and workers during the pandemic,” reports The Hill. “Under the program, small businesses can receive loans that will be forgiven if they maintain their payroll.”

Mnuchin appeared to soften his position somewhat on Monday, saying in a tweet that he’ll have bipartisan discussions with the Senate Small Business Committee “and others” about “proper oversight” of PPP recipients.

I will be having discussions with the Senate @SmallBizCmte and others on a bipartisan basis to strike the appropriate balance for proper oversight of #ppploans and appropriate protection of small business information. @SBAgov

— Steven Mnuchin (@stevenmnuchin1) June 15, 2020

But a Democratic-led House subcommittee wants much more data than Mnuchin seems willing to release. It’s demanding that the Treasury Department, the SBA and some large banks “turn over detailed information about which businesses applied for and received federal loans,” the AP says.

When the PPP was rolled out earlier this year, members of Congress and government watchdog groups challenged the SBA for its lack of transparency.

A lobbyist for the advocacy group Public Citizen told the Post that transparency is the “first line of defense for the public to make sure the money is being awarded to the businesses that are supposed to be getting it.”

One sidelight to all this involves charter schools — schools that are publicly funded but privately run. Dozens of them are seeking PPP money.

These schools “have decided for the purpose of coronavirus relief that they are businesses, applying for aid even as they continue to enjoy funding from school budgets, tax-free status and, in some cases, healthy cash balances and the support of billionaire backers,” reports the New York Times.

Charter-school critics say that’s wrong.

“To me, either you’re a fish or a fowl — you can’t say you’re a public school one day, but now because it’s advantageous, say you’re a business,” said Carol Burris, the executive director of a charter school watchdog group, the Network for Public Education.