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The Internal Revenue Service improperly disclosed the confidential taxpayer information of thousands of people with the Department of Homeland Security as part of the agencies’ controversial agreement to share immigrant data to help identify those living in the country illegally, according to a new court filing.
The Treasury Department, the IRS and the Department of Homeland Security finalized a deal last spring to allow taxpayer data to be shared with immigration authorities to help them find illegal immigrants.
The agreement, which led to the resignations of top IRS officials, authorized Immigration and Customs Enforcement to submit names and addresses of illegal immigrants to the IRS for cross-verification against tax records.
In a declaration filed Wednesday, IRS Chief Risk and Control Officer Dottie Romo said the IRS was able to verify roughly 47,000 of the 1.28 million names ICE requested that were then disclosed to the immigration enforcement agency.
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The IRS gave ICE additional address information for under 5% of those names, potentially violating privacy rules created to protect taxpayer data.
The tax-collecting agency said it recently discovered the mistake and is working with other federal agencies to resolve the matter.
Romo said the Treasury notified DHS last month of the error and asked for its assistance in “promptly taking steps to remediate the matter consistent with federal law,” which includes “appropriate disposal of any data provided to ICE by IRS based on incomplete or insufficient address information.”
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The agreement last year between the IRS and DHS sparked litigation against the Trump administration and broke a longstanding IRS policy that encouraged immigrants to pay taxes even if they are not in the U.S. legally by assuring them that their data was safe.
A lawsuit was filed against Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem on behalf of several immigrant rights groups shortly after the agreement was signed.
Last week, a federal judge ordered the IRS to stop disclosing residential addresses to ICE, marking the second ruling blocking the IRS-DHS agreement.
In November, a different federal judge blocked the IRS from sharing information with DHS, saying the IRS illegally disseminated the tax data of some migrants over the summer, violating a taxpayer confidentiality law.
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Advocate groups expressed concern that the potential unlawful release of taxpayer records could be used to maliciously target U.S. citizens and violate their privacy.
“Once taxpayer data is opened to immigration enforcement, mistakes are inevitable and the consequences fall on innocent people,” Tom Bowman, policy counsel for the Center for Democracy & Technology, told The Associated Press. “The disclosure of thousands of confidential records unfortunately shows precisely why strict legal firewalls exist and have — until now — been treated as an important guardrail.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.