(News Nation) – The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is approaching a contract in which Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency (ICE) can access confidential taxpayer information and find undocumented immigrants targeting deportation. The Washington Post reported.
The proposed data sharing arrangement allows ICE to submit a suspicious name and address Undocumented immigrants To the IRS for verification of tax records.
This marks a big change Long-standing IRS policytraditionally kept taxpayer information strictly secret.
According to some of the draft agreements obtained by the Post Office, ICE access will be limited to verifying the address of the immigrant in a final deletion order. Requests were submitted only by the Secretary of Homeland Security. Christie Noem Or, according to the Post, he plays Ice Director Todd Lions.
The agreement says it will allow data verification of individuals “subject to criminal investigations” for breaching immigration law.
Career IRS officials have issued warnings about the proposed arrangement and reported concerns that narrow exceptions could be exploited to taxpayer privacy laws aimed at criminal investigations rather than enforcement of immigration.
For decades, the IRS has ensured that undocumented immigrants will encourage their tax information to remain confidential and file tax returns without fear of deportation. About half of the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants on US filing income tax returns, according to the Post.
The potential agreement follows a change in leadership in the IRS.
Last month he played IRS Commissioner Doug O'Donnell DHS request with 700,000 data has been rejected There was a suspected undocumented immigration, which was deemed illegal. O'Donnell retired the following day, 38 years later, from his agency.
His successor, Melanie KrausThe post reportedly shows a strong will to work with DHS officials. The Trump administration has replaced it IRS's top lawyeropposed sharing taxpayer data between agents.
The move encourages President Donald Trump to push his administration and use all the resources available for what he described as the biggest deportation effort in US history.
DHS representatives did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The data sharing agreement has not yet been finalized.
