According to a person familiar with the preparations, the IRS will start laying off some 7,000 employees in Washington and across the nation on Thursday.
The person, who spoke on condition of anonymity and was not authorized to reveal the plans, said the layoffs primarily affect compliance department personnel and are aimed at probationary employees who have been with the agency for one year or less. Among other things, compliance work involves making sure that taxpayers are paying their taxes, filing their forms, and following the tax code.
Through the Department of Government Efficiency, the Trump administration has stepped up its attempts to reduce the size of the federal workforce by directing agencies to fire almost all probationary employees who have not yet received civil service protection. They occur in spite of the fact that earlier this month, IRS staffers working on the 2025 tax season were informed that they would not be permitted to take a buyout offer from the Trump administration until mid-May, following the deadline for taxpayer filings.
The impact of the cutbacks on tax collection services this year is unknown. During the Biden administration, the IRS was charged with targeting high-wealth tax evaders as the country’s revenue collector in order to generate additional cash for the $36 trillion in debt owed by the United States. The IRS collected more than $1.3 billion in unpaid taxes from wealthy tax evaders by the end of 2024.
According to the most recent IRS figures, the IRS employs about 90,000 people nationwide. Women make up 65% of the IRS workforce, while members of racial minorities make up 56%.
The Trump administration also plans to loan IRS employees to the Department of Homeland Security to help with immigration enforcement, in addition to the scheduled layoffs. DHS Secretary Kristi Noem requested Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent to lend IRS personnel to support continued immigration enforcement efforts in a letter earlier this month.
Requests for response from the AP were not answered by U.S. Treasury and IRS officials.
The Associated Press’s Fatima Hussein
