Federal judge allows IRS to share illegal alien data with DHS in court win for Trump
A federal judge on Monday denied an injunction request to prevent the Department of Homeland Security and Internal Revenue Service from partnering to permit U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement (ICE) to access taxpayer information to locate illegal immigrants subject to deportation.
The order by U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich came amid a lawsuit by Centro de Trabajadores Unidos and other immigrant-rights groups against Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.
"Plaintiffs Centro de Trabajadores Unidos, Immigrant Solidarity DuPage, Somos Un Pueblo Unido, and Inclusive Action for the City bring this action seeking declaratory and injunctive relief to prevent the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) from sharing personal tax information with the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for immigration enforcement purposes. Before the Court is the plaintiffs’ Motion for Preliminary Injunction, Dkt. 28. For the reasons that follow, the Court will deny the motion."
"At its core, this case presents a narrow legal issue: Does the Memorandum of Understanding between the IRS and DHS violate the Internal Revenue Code? It does not," the order continued.
Nonprofits Centro de Trabajadores Unidos and Immigrant Solidarity DuPage, representing immigrant workers in the Chicago area, brought the lawsuit against Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent, the IRS, and Commissioner of Internal Revenue Melanie Krause, seeking to block the disclosure of personal information of taxpayers and other confidential tax records to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for immigration enforcement purposes.
In a statement to Fox News Digital, Tricia McLaughlin, the DHS assistant secretary of public affairs, said information shirring across all federal agencies to identify illegal immigrants is essential in order to "determine what public safety and terror threats may exist so we can neutralize them, scrub these individuals from voter rolls, as well as identify what public benefits these aliens are using at taxpayer expense."
"Under President Trump’s leadership, the government is finally doing what it should have all along—sharing information across the federal government to solve problems," she said. "Biden not only allowed millions of illegal aliens—including gang members, suspected terrorists, and violent criminals—to flood into our country, but he also lost them due to incompetence and improper processing."
"Information sharing across agencies is essential to identify who is in our country and determine what public safety and terror threats may exist so we can neutralize them, scrub these individuals from voter rolls, as well as identify what public benefits these aliens are using at taxpayer expense.
"Today’s ruling is a victory for the American people and for commonsense."
An earlier memorandum of understanding between DHS and the IRS outlines a process to ensure that sensitive taxpayer data information is protected while allowing law enforcement to pursue criminal violations, a senior Treasury Department official said at the time the deal was reached in April.
The deal allows DHS to ask the IRS to confirm the home addresses of illegal immigrants suspected of violating deportation orders. The IRS can share data to aid criminal investigations but is prohibited from sharing information related to civil matters, such as facilitating deportations.
The Treasury Department is committed to protecting the privacy of law-abiding taxpayers, but a criminal exception obligates the agency to assist law enforcement, the official told Fox News Digital at the time.
Fox News Digital has reached out to the IRS, DHS and the legal team for the groups involved in the lawsuit.
The deal would allow ICE to submit the names and addresses of illegal immigrants to the IRS, who could then cross-check those immigrants' tax records and provide the immigration agency with current address information.
"The Court agrees that requesting and receiving information for civil enforcement purposes would constitute a cognizable injury, but none of the organizations have established that such an injury is imminent," Friedrich wrote. "As the plaintiffs acknowledge, the Memorandum only allows sharing information for criminal investigations."
As the Memorandum provides, its purpose is to establish procedures enabling "requests for addresses of persons subject to criminal investigation," the order said.
The agreement comes as President Donald Trump has continued to ramp up the deportation effort he promised on the campaign trail.
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