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John,
Before the Inflation Reduction Act, deep budget cuts had left the IRS struggling to provide adequate customer service and without the enforcement needed to go after wealthy tax cheats.
As a result, audits of high-income earners―which require substantial resources due to their complicated tax returns―plummeted and audits of low-income earners greatly increased. African-American taxpayers are three times more likely to be audited by the IRS than any other group of taxpayers―including ultra-wealthy millionaires and billionaires. In fact, the most audited county in the United States is Humphreys County, Mississippi1―a county of 7,551 people that’s 75% Black and where the per capita income is $21,861.2
In a cruel twist of fate, the main reason these communities are audited at such high rates is because they’re low-income, with many receiving the Earned Income Tax Credit available to low-wage workers―and this is exactly what Congressional Republicans want. By ensuring the IRS did not have adequate funding, some in Congress appear perfectly happy for their wealthy tax cheat donors to continue to avoid paying their fair share in taxes (since their tax returns were far more complicated to review) while low-income people are audited at disproportionate rates.
The current House FY 2025 spending proposal would rescind $20 billion from the IRS included in the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act. This would threaten much-needed efforts to modernize the agency, serve everyday taxpayers, and impede the IRS’s ability to ensure that the wealthy and large corporations pay the taxes that they legally owe. Like many proposed cuts and harmful policy changes in the House’s proposed spending bills, extremists are pushing for radical changes to the IRS consistent with the broader Project 2025.3
Send a message to your senators and representative now and urge them to reject any and all IRS funding cuts.
Thank you for all you do,
Meredith Dodson
Senior Director of Public Policy, CHN Action
1 ‘They’re easiest to step on’: The real reason why families in the Delta, one of the nation’s poorest regions, are also the most audited by the IRS
2 QuickFacts Humphreys County, Mississippi
3 Project 2025 Tax Overhaul Blueprint: What You Need to Know
-- DEBORAH'S EMAIL --
John,
The House FY2025 Financial Services and General Government (FSGG) proposal that was recently introduced by House Republicans would slash the IRS’s regular annual funding to levels not seen since the early 2000’s.
The House proposal cuts $350 million from IRS operations, which funds core taxpayer services. It would cut $2 billion from tax enforcement, a move that would prevent the IRS from continuing its success in recouping back taxes from wealthy tax cheats―as of this month, as a result of the historic 2022 investment in the IRS, the agency has collected $1 billion in back taxes owed by the wealthy.1 In fact, for every dollar invested in cracking down on wealthy tax cheats, it results in a $22 return.2
Cutting enforcement so that the IRS cannot collect taxes owed by the ultra-wealthy cuts off funding for programs and services that uplift low-income communities. The failure to invest in our people will set our economy back, hurting us all.
Send a direct letter to your members of Congress urging them to vote against these dangerous cuts to the IRS and to reject attacks on the IRS’s new Direct File program, which is serving everyday taxpayers.
SIGN & SEND
In addition to cutting IRS funding, Republicans in the House recently introduced a bill that would block the Department of the Treasury from fully implementing the massively successful IRS Direct File program nationwide.3
The Direct File program allowed over 140,000 taxpayers across 12 pilot states to use the IRS’s new, free, online tax filing system―Direct File―to receive more than $90 million in refunds and save an estimated $5.6 million in tax preparation fees.4
Every $1 invested in Direct File returns an average $106 in benefits to taxpayers. If fully expanded, the program would save U.S. taxpayers $11 billion annually in filing fees and time costs.5
We need members of Congress to put the needs of U.S. taxpayers ahead of the needs of the tax preparation lobby. Since 2003, the tax preparation industry has spent more than $93 million on federal lobbying efforts to prevent an IRS program like Direct File that allows taxpayers to e-file their taxes for free. Intuit―the parent company of TurboTax―spent $3.8 million in 2023 lobbying federal lawmakers, a company record.6
When fully funded, the IRS is a benefit to the majority of Americans by offering free tax preparation services and cracking down on the ultra-wealthy who think they can enjoy all the benefits of our society without paying their fair share in taxes.
Join us in calling on Congress to reject attempts to defund the IRS and to protect Direct File for millions of U.S. taxpayers.
Thank you for all you do,
Deborah Weinstein
Executive Director, CHN Action
1 IRS collects milestone $1 billion in back taxes from high-wealth taxpayers
2 CONSERVATIVE EFFORTS TO PAD WEALTHY TAX CHEATS’ POCKETS
3 GOP Pushes Bill Prohibiting IRS Direct File Implementation
4 Warren, Carper, Beyer, Porter, Sherman Lead Over 130 Lawmakers Touting Direct File’s Successes, Urges Biden Administration to Expand Program, Make Permanent
5 The Impact of Direct File—by the Numbers
6 TurboTax maker Intuit spent millions in record lobbying blitz amid threats to tax prep industry
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