President Trump has given buyouts or tried to terminate employment of more than 11,000 people at the IRS, with a disproportionate share of those coming from the agency’s ranks of auditors, an inspector general said Monday.
More than 7,300 probationary employees have received termination notices, and 4,100 were approved for the deferred resignation program, also known as the “fork in the road.”
The IRS is eyeing even more cuts, with another deferred resignation program. As of April 22, 23,000 employees had applied and 13,125 were approved.
The IRS had 103,000 employees on board as of February, so the 11,000 who took the initial buyout or were terminated is an 11% drop, according to the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration.
Add in the 13,000 approved for the second buyout, and the department would be down roughly 25%.
TIGTA said every state saw layoffs, with Iowa, Colorado, Mississippi and Idaho getting hit the hardest, with at least 20% of their employees gone.
Most of the probationary employees fired had less than a year on the job. The buyout takers, though, were more senior. Nearly a quarter of the buyout takers had more than 21 years at the agency, and 15% had more than a decade.
The legal status of the probationary employees is tricky right now.
A federal court in Maryland ruled in March that the probationary employees needed to be reinstated.
The Supreme Court last month put that ruling on hold, seemingly clearing the way for the firings to take effect again.
“Currently, it is unclear whether any probationary employees will remain reinstated or be terminated in a large-scale Reduction in Force,” the inspector general said.
The cuts reverse what had been a buildup at the tax agency under President Biden, who said he was reversing the cuts of the previous decade.
The IRS went from about 84,000 full-time equivalent positions in 2014 down to 73,519 positions in 2018 before ticking back up to about 76,000 in 2000, at the end of Mr. Trump’s term.
Mr. Biden won an infusion of cash from his 2022 budget-climate legislation, helping fuel the hiring of tens of thousands more employees. Biden officials said the new workers were needed to improve customer service and to perform audits — particularly on high-income tax cheats.
The inspector general said the cuts under Mr. Trump have been particularly deep for the audit sides of the agency, with 5,765 positions — about 23% — in the Small Business and/Self Employed division and 1,733 positions — 25% — at the Large Business and International division.
Taxpayer services, the customer service branch, saw 1,714 positions ended, which was 4% of its workforce.
Some IRS officials have said the probationary employee firings broke the law because they targeted people with no documented performance problems. The inspector general said it is conducting a review to assess those allegations.
