22,000 IRS employees accept Trump admin buyout offer: report

Over 22,000 Internal Revenue Service (IRS) employees have accepted the Trump administration’s deferred resignation program offer.

Two agency sources revealed to Reuters the vast number of IRS employees who have accepted the deferred resignation program offered to federal workers this month in the administration’s latest buyout offer that would see workers receiving full pay and benefits through September 30. Most have been told they don’t have to work during their last few months.

The IRS started with around 100,000 employees when Trump took office, with 7,000 probationary employees being fired earlier this year and another 5,000 employees leaving in the past three months. Under Joe Biden’s administration, the IRS was increased by around 20,000 workers.

Across the civilian federal workforce of around 2.3 million employees, around 200,000 workers have left through buyout offers, layoffs, and resignations.

This comes as Acting IRS head Melanie Krause resigned earlier in April, marking the third head of the IRS to resign since January. Part of the reason Krause left was because of the data sharing agreement reached with the Department of Homeland Security, in which the IRS would share data on illegal immigrants with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to help track down illegal immigrants in the country.

Some fiscal watchdog groups have expressed concerns over losing so many workers at one time, saying that it would interfere with the agency’s tax collections and processing.

"I worry that this Administration’s destructive initiatives at IRS will cost the federal government hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue while putting taxpayer services and privacy at risk,” said Chye-Ching Huang, executive director of the nonpartisan Tax Law Center at New York University.