Trump’s administration began shooting about 6,700 employees in the internal revenue service on Thursday, according to people who are familiar with the issue, expanding cost cutting measures to the federal service responsible for collecting tax revenue from millions.
Job cuts at IRS hit test employees recently hired across the country. More than 5,000 of these workers are part of the organization’s compliance groups, which are involved in control and collections. The redundancies come a week during the tax deposit season, when the IRS is flooded with bureaucracy and questions from taxpayers.
The IRS employs about 100,000 accountants, lawyers and other staff across the country. Biden’s administration was in the process of enhancing and modernizing the Organization with an investment of $ 80 billion, but President Trump wants to limit its powers and has sent Elon Musk and the so -called government efficiency department to control its computer systems. .
An IRS spokesman refused to provide an accurate number for redundancies, which some were familiar with with the issue they said could be as low as 6,000 or 7,000. People received anonymity because they had not been authorized to publicly discuss the situation.
Kevin Hassett, director of the White House National Financial Council, said Thursday that layoffs are “absolutely on the table for good reasons” and that Finance Minister Scott Bessent believes that the organization could afford to lose more than 3,500 people .
Asked if IRS employees were left out of poor performance, Mr Hassett said: “Our goal is to ensure that the workers we pay are productive and effective and there are more than 100,000 people working to collect taxes and not all of them are fully occupied. “
Commerce Minister Howard Lutnick told Fox News on Wednesday that Mr Trump wants to replace the IRS with an “foreign revenue service” to be funded by duties.
“His goal is to abolish the internal revenue service and let all strangers pay,” Mr Lutnick said.
The Treasury had no comment on work cuts.
In the emails sent on Wednesday, IRS managers told employees that they were aiming for redundancies that they were not considered critical for the deposit period, the annual period during which millions of Americans are preparing their taxes. However, the large redundancies before the Spring tax deadline concerned some tax experts and Democrats that IRS could have trouble processing tax returns this year.
The National Ministry of Finance, which represents IRS employees, attacked the dismissal as a crucial mistake by Trump’s administration. The working group called on the fires “arbitrary and illegal”.
“The inquisitive fires of IRS officials across the country are a recipe for economic disaster,” said Doreen Greenwald, president of NTEU National. “In the middle of a tax deposit season, when taxpayers expect immediate customer service and smoothly processing their tax returns, the administration has chosen to decimate the entire business by sending dedicated civil servants to unemployment lines.”
Fires at IRS are expected to hit recent hiring workers focusing on the organization’s enforcement efforts. The tax service is trying to hire more lawyers and accountants who can control the wealthy Americans and big companies to collect more than the tax they owe. The IRS estimates that about $ 600 billion on taxes due do not enter each year.
“These incorrect redundancies will harm everyday Americans who pay their taxes and count on IRS to pay refunds in time, encouraging rich people and big businesses to deceive their taxes,” said Chye-Ching Huang, executive Center for Tax Law University of New York.
Mr Hassett said that the IRS was just a “small piece” of Trump’s management plan to shoot workers who were considered bad interpreters.
“I live in DC,” said Hassett. “No one goes to buildings, people don’t move because people don’t do their job.”
“We define this and IRS is a small part of this image.”
This was clear on Thursday, as fires continued throughout the federal government.
Trump’s administration shot 243 testing employees to the Transport Security Administration, the Agency confirmed on Thursday.
Those who allow TSA officers and other administrative staff. Despite the cuts, the organization said, it continues to consume critical positions for the mission.
TSA, which is part of the internal security department, was formed after the September 11 terrorist attacks. Congress has accused the organization of protecting nation’s transport systems.
“Under President Trump’s leadership, TSA finished staff due to performance and issues during their trial period,” Carter Langston, a spokesman for the organization, said in a statement. “The Agency is actively working to implement the administration’s priorities in full cooperation with DHS to detect waste and for the staff of the basic positions of the mission that best fulfill the DHS mission.”
The CIA also moved to reject an unspecified number of officers working on recruitment and diversity, according to former officials. A federal judge has stopped these actions and will hear Monday on whether the CIA can proceed with redundancies, which would be the largest massive firing since 1977.
Walker signal and Julian E. Barnes They contributed reports.
