Romney to release tax return on Tuesday Under-pressure Republican presidential hopeful Mitt Romney vowed to release his 2010 tax return on Tuesday, seeking to erase the toxic issue before Florida's crucial primary on January 31. The release of his most recent year of tax returns as well as an estimate for his upcoming filings for 2011 may not fully satisfy critics who have demanded a more complete disclosure going back several years. But it represents a major shift for Romney, who initially refused to release any information and then said he would do so only in April. Given the distraction that I think they became in these last couple weeks... I will release my tax returns for 2010, which is the last returns that were completed," he told Fox News Sunday. "I will do that on Tuesday this week," he said. I will also, release at the same time, an estimate for 2011 tax returns. The tax issue, which feeds into voter concern over Romney's vast wealth and how he earned it, has plagued his campaign of late and the candidate admitted on Sunday that it had been an error not releasing the information sooner. I think we just made a mistake in holding off as long as we did. It was a distraction. We want to get back to the real issues in the campaign. Romney, who was roundly defeated on Saturday in South Carolina's primary by surging rival Newt Gingrich in a result that turned the Republican presidential battle on its head, insisted he had nothing to hide. "I know people will try and find something, but we pay full, fair taxes and I'm sure people will find it's a substantial amount," he said. Democrats, as well as Romney's challengers for the Republican nomination to take on President Barack Obama in November, have been hammering the multi-millionaire businessman for stalling on the release of his tax records. Critics have said they could show damaging information about how little tax he has paid over the years or reveal large amounts of money kept in offshore tax shelters in the Cayman Islands. They are also likely to show that a certain percentage of his income is given to the Mormon church. Romney's faith is an issue for many Christian evangelicals, who make up a large proportion of Republican primary voters. No Mormon has ever been picked as the presidential nominee. Romney, thought to be worth between $190 million and $250 million, has said he pays an effective tax rate of about 15 percent, which would be in line with tax laws that Obama has denounced as lopsidedly favoring the rich. The tax issue plays right into concerns over the manner in which Romney accrued his massive wealth and his ability to relate to working-class people in an America crawling out of recession with stubbornly high unemployment. Opponents have tarred the former Massachusetts governor as a ruthless corporate raider who profited while workers lost their jobs, heaping scorn on his claim to have helped create 100,000 jobs while CEO of Bain Capital. Romney pitches himself as a successful entrepreneur with the business acumen to create jobs and turn around an American economy that he claims has been ruined by Obama's policies. In reality, the son of wealth and privilege spent much of his business career in the cut-throat world of venture capital and had a questionable record as a job-creator when he was governor of Massachusetts. A photograph of a young Romney posing with Bain Capital colleagues with dollars bulging out of their pockets has done him no favors at a time when many Americans are jobless and struggling to make ends meet. An ill-advised comment made on the eve of the New Hampshire primary -- "I like being able to fire people who provide services to me" -- was seized upon by opponents as evidence of Romney's callous nature. In reality, the remark was twisted out of context: Romney was trying to say that he wanted Americans to be able to switch insurance companies if they were unhappy with their service. But the slip-up followed earlier gaffes, including a baffling decision to propose a $10,000 bet with Texas Governor Rick Perry during a televised debate, that reinforce the notion that Romney is out of touch with the economic concerns of the average voter.