President Trump has sued the IRS, saying his own tax agency should pay him $10 billion for having allowed his private tax information to be leaked during his first term in office.
Mr. Trump and sons Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr. said the IRS gave access to Charles Littlejohn, a contractor who used his access to the IRS databases to hone in on Mr. Trump’s tax information. He managed to exfiltrate it and deliver it to The New York Times, which published intimate details of the president’s finances.
Littlejohn would eventually be discovered, charged and convicted of the breach. He is serving a federal prison sentence.
The Trumps said that despite working for a contractor, Booz Allen Hamilton, the IRS treated Littlejohn like a federal employee, so the tax agency bears responsibility for his behavior. They said the IRS ignored warnings about its technology, leaving it vulnerable to Littlejohn’s moves.
“Defendants were obligated to have appropriate technical, employee screening, security, and monitoring systems to prevent Littlejohn’s unlawful conduct,” the lawsuit said Thursday. “Defendants failed to take such mandatory precautions.”
The case raises a host of tricky questions. The sitting president, acting as a business executive, is suing his own administration, in a case that his own Justice and Treasury departments will have to defend.
And the payout, if there is one, would come from taxpayers to the Trump family.
“There’s no length Trump and his family won’t go to enrich themselves on the backs of American taxpayers,” said Rep. Richard Neal, the top Democrat on the House Ways and Means Committee. “This lawsuit isn’t about justice. It’s another scheme to rob America blind.”
The Treasury Department recently canceled contracts with Booz Allen, citing the leak as a reason. The consulting firm, though, said it was the IRS that ran the systems Littlejohn exploited. The firm said the IRS stores all the taxpayer data and is in charge of monitoring its use.
That could bolster Mr. Trump’s case that the IRS is responsible for the leak.
The law allowing damages applies in cases where an “officer or employee” of the government discloses tax information.
The law also allows for $1,000 in damages to be paid for “each act” of disclosure. Mr. Trump came to the $10 billion figure by taking that penalty and multiplying it by the number of eyeballs that viewed The New York Times reporting and subsequent coverage by other outlets.
Littlejohn also stole and leaked secret tax information on thousands of wealthy Americans to ProPublica, including information on Mr. Trump.
The breaches happened in 2019 and 2020. The Trump family said it was officially notified of the breach in 2024, kicking off a two-year window in which to file the new lawsuit.
Littlejohn said he took the consultant’s job with the intention of fetching Mr. Trump’s secret tax information.
He went through complicated machinations to exfiltrate the data, including setting up a website to collect it. He then downloaded it to flash drives.
He said his access was complete, and he could have stolen any return he wanted.
Democrats mocked Mr. Trump’s lawsuit.
“Donald Trump is a cheat and a grifter to his core, and for him to abuse his office in an attempt to steal $10 billion from the American taxpayer is a shameless, disgusting act of corruption,” said Sen. Ron Wyden, the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, which oversees the IRS.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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