US Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is on the verge of finalizing a historic agreement with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). This new agreement would give them access to taxpayer data to help strengthen former President Donald Trump’s deportation policies. Such a potential deal would represent a major step toward the privatization of taxpayer data. It would move from its infrequent use to constructing criminal cases, to using it to impose immigration sanctions more often. This would make sense in light of the years-long, aggressive anti-immigration agenda that Trump has been trying to push.
Taxpayer confidentiality has been a longstanding practice under IRS administration that the taxpayers have to trust. Under section 6103 of the IRS code, there are narrow exceptions where that data can be shared. Even in violation of US laws, undocumented immigrants in the US pay taxes per IRS’s website. The agency allows these impacted people to file their taxes using individual taxpayer identification numbers (ITINs) rather than SSNs. This makes sure that they are subject to the same kind of reporting requirements that apply to US persons.
Under the terms of the proposed data-sharing agreement, ICE would be able to give the IRS names and addresses of undocumented immigrants. The IRS would then be required to cross-reference this information with their taxpayer—now confidential—databases. According to Politico, the IRS is worried about this new trend. Our partners at the Washington Post’s 90-Second New Deal have been following this negotiation process for the past few weeks.
In a welcoming move on Friday, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced a big deal. They’ve announced plans to revoke temporary legal status for more than 530,000 people from Cuba, Haiti, Nicaragua and Venezuela. This decision is especially significant given the fact that the Trump administration has dramatically increased immigration enforcement actions.
Sources familiar with the ongoing story told the Washington Post that using such privacy law exceptions against immigration enforcement is unprecedented. This practice isn’t as widespread as it should be. The possible deal raises serious alarms over civil liberties and privacy. Most importantly, it challenges the use of taxpayer information in immigration enforcement proceedings.
In response to controversy over these recent deportations, the Trump administration cited the 1798 Alien Enemies Act to defend its actions. Just last weekend, this law enabled the deportation of 137 Venezuelan migrants. The administration argued that these people were all engaged in violent crime. They were remitting back to Venezuela, which provided grounds for their deportation under wartime law. Tom Homan, ICE director under Donald Trump and an architect of the agency’s cruel tactics, had little patience for these judges’ concerns about such deportations.
"I don’t care what the judges think as far as this case," said Tom Homan.