US IRS expected to fire 6,700 employees on Feb 20 in Trump downsizing spree
Sign up now: Get ST's newsletters delivered to your inbox
The planned cuts are part of US President Donald Trump’s radical downsizing effort.
PHOTO: REUTERS
Follow topic:
WASHINGTON - The US Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is expected to fire about 6,700 employees on Feb 20, a person familiar with the matter said, eliminating roughly 7 per cent of the tax-collecting agency’s workforce amid the critical tax-filing season.
The planned cuts are part of President Donald Trump’s radical downsizing effort
The planned layoffs at the IRS would largely target workers at the 95,000-person agency who were hired as part of an expansion under former Democratic President Joe Biden, who had sought to expand enforcement efforts on wealthy taxpayers.
Mr Trump’s Republicans have blasted that effort, saying without evidence that middle-class Americans and small business owners would be the ones hardest hit.
The workers being cut are in their probationary period and enjoy fewer protections than career employees.
The IRS, which has not confirmed the planned cuts, has taken a more careful approach to downsizing than other agencies, given that it is in the middle of its busiest period, with the April 15 tax filing deadline just two months away.
The 2025 tax filing season opened on Jan 27, with the IRS expecting over 140 million individual tax year 2024 returns by the federal filing deadline.
The dismissals targeted employees involved in a variety of roles, ranging from revenue agents to specialised auditors to IT specialists across all 50 states, Puerto Rico and Washington, according to the person familiar with the matter.
The IRS will retain several thousand probationary employees deemed critical for processing tax returns, including those involved in supporting and advocating for taxpayers, the source said.
The White House has not said how many of the nation’s 2.3 million civil-service workers it wants to fire and has given no numbers on the mass layoffs. Roughly 75,000 took a buyout offer last week.
The campaign has delighted Republicans for culling a federal workforce they view as bloated, corrupt and insufficiently loyal to Mr Trump, while also taking aim at government agencies that regulate big business and collect taxes – including those that oversee Mr Musk’s companies SpaceX, Tesla and Neuralink.
Mr Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency team has also cancelled contracts worth about US$8.5 billion (S$11.3 billion) involving foreign aid, diversity training and other initiatives opposed by Mr Trump.
Both men have set a goal of cutting at least US$1 trillion from the US$6.7 trillion federal budget, though Mr Trump has said he will not touch popular benefit programmes that make up roughly one-third of that total.
Democratic critics say Mr Trump is exceeding his constitutional authority and hacking away at popular and critical government programmes at the expense of legions of middle-class families.
