“We have a duty to protect the American taxpayer from an already supercharged IRS that exerts too much control over their lives.”

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith (MO-08) issued the following statement after the attorneys general of twelve U.S. states slammed the Biden Administration’s efforts to sidestep Congress and establish a direct file system for American taxpayers at the Internal Revenue Service (IRS):

Chairman Smith said, “From the beginning, the Biden Administration tipped the scales in favor of a direct file program that the American people did not want or need. The outcome of the $15 million ‘feasibility study’ authorized by the Inflation Reduction Act was a foregone conclusion, and taxpayers are rightfully concerned about having the already distrusted IRS function as their tax preparer, filer, and auditor. Additionally, the IRS has not been able to provide information about the overall cost of the direct file scheme, leaving many unanswered questions about how much it will cost American taxpayers to develop and maintain a direct file program. 

“I applaud the state attorneys general for joining Ways and Means Committee Republicans in condemning the Biden Administration’s efforts to unilaterally establish direct file without authorization from Congress, and I look forward to working alongside them to stop this bureaucratic grab in its tracks. We have a duty to protect the American taxpayer from an already supercharged IRS that exerts too much control over their lives.”  

You can read the full letter from the 12 state attorneys general here.

Background:

• The Inflation Reduction Act required an “independent third party” to report on “the overall feasibility, approach, schedule, cost, organization design, and Internal Revenue Service capacity to deliver such a direct e-file tax return system.”
• To produce that report, President Biden’s IRS hired New America – an organization populated by Democrat Party operatives and other left-leaning officials – which had already stated “the government…can and should build this tool in the coming years.”
• The Biden Administration also appointed a left-leaning professor to assist in the supposedly “independent” review of the direct file proposal – an individual that has previously been on the record openly championing the establishment of such a program at the IRS.
• To make matters worse, the IRS conveniently cherrypicked the results of a nonpartisan MITRE study in their final report to Congress, omitting the study’s findings that most working-class Americans do not want an IRS direct file system, citing a lack of trust in government.
• A direct file program like that imagined in the Inflation Reduction Act has been a long-time priority of Senator Bernie Sanders, Senator Elizabeth Warren, and Representative Alexandria Ocasio- Cortez to give the IRS control over both the filing and auditing of tax returns.

READ:ICYMI: Former Obama-Biden Chief Information Officer Says New IRS E-File System “Guaranteed to Fail”

READ: Watchdog: IRS Cooked the Books on Direct E-File Study, Misled American Taxpayers

READ: Report on Direct E-File Program Confirms Biden Administration Always Intended to Make the IRS America’s Tax Preparer, Filer, and AuditorREAD: Smith, Schweikert Call Out Biden Administration for Cooking the Books on IRS E-File Study