IRS building system to give ICE on-demand access to taxpayer data

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is developing a system that would provide federal immigration authorities with on-demand access to sensitive taxpayer information. The system, first reported by ProPublica, is stirring concern among IRS employees and civil liberties advocates, while some Trump administration officials defend its development as necessary for deporting “criminal illegal aliens.”

The unnamed system is intended to help immigration agents with deportation orders by providing them with up-to-date addresses and telephone numbers of targeted individuals. One agent, who spoke with ProPublica on condition of anonymity, said deportations by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) have been hampered by outdated address information.

Currently, law enforcement agencies seeking information from the IRS must provide the target’s full legal name and address, as well as an explanation of why the request is related to a criminal investigation. A former IRS official told ProPublica that such requests rarely involve more than a dozen individuals.

Under the new system, ICE –– which has already demanded the addresses of 7.3 million taxpayers, according to ProPublica –– would allegedly be required to provide names, previous addresses, evidence of immigration removal orders, the criminal statutes being used to investigate targets and the tax period from which the data is sought.

However, a former senior IRS official told ProPublica that there’s “no way ICE has 7 million real criminal investigations.”

“That’s a fantasy,” the former official said, describing the request as both “unprecedented” and “a big data dump.”

Less oversight envisioned

At present, the request has not been approved.

If the system finds a match following a request, the tax files of targeted individuals, which include addresses from the most recent tax period, would be handed over to ICE. The response would also include “a record of names rejected for lack of required information and names for which it could not make a match,” ProPublica reported.

Such checks would also no longer require approval from IRS officials, who currently must consider the legality of each request before releasing taxpayer data.

An IRS engineer told ProPublica that if the program is implemented as designed, “it’s extremely likely that incorrect addresses will be given to DHS and individuals will be wrongly targeted.”

White House defends new system

White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said opposition to the new system was akin to turning “a blind eye to criminal illegal aliens present in the United States.”

“This isn’t a surveillance system… It’s part of President Trump’s promise to carry out the mass deportation of criminal illegal aliens — the promise that the American people elected him on and he is committed to fulfilling,” Jackson told ProPublica.

Last month, however, an ICE attorney proposed an alteration to new data requests to include anyone “associated with criminal activities which may include United States citizens or lawful permanent residents.” The proposal, detailed in a document obtained by ProPublica, raises questions over whether the system could be used to target lawful citizens.