Undocumented immigrants paid more than $96.7 billion in federal, state and local taxes in 2022 alone. As they have for years, they paid taxes that year with no path to citizenship, no protection from deportation and no guarantees that their situations would change for the better. That deal was stacked against them, but they did it anyway, putting their trust in a country that claimed to offer promise and possibility, especially if you contribute and pay your fair share.
Undocumented immigrants paid more than $96.7 billion in federal, state and local taxes in 2022 alone.
That trust was shattered Monday when the Trump administration told a court that the IRS had struck a deal with Immigration and Customs Enforcement to “use its protected tax records to help homeland security officials deport immigrants,” according to The New York Times. After the news broke, several top IRS officials, including the acting commissioner, resigned.
For years, Republican extremists, including President Donald Trump and his allies, have spread the lie that undocumented immigrants don’t contribute to this country’s economy. According to them, such migrants drain resources, cheat the system and live off the government. It’s a lie designed to justify cruelty, and Monday’s turn of events further exposes the outrageousness of that falsehood. At the very least, based on the Trump administration’s plan to use IRS records to aid in deportations, we should all agree that undocumented immigrants are paying taxes. They’ve been doing so for decades.
The IRS created the Individual Taxpayer Identification Number (ITIN) to allow people without Social Security numbers to pay taxes in 1996. Millions of undocumented immigrants have used ITINs to report income and stay compliant with tax laws, even though they remain excluded from most public benefits.
The government insists this data-sharing deal will apply only to migrants with judicial orders of removal. However, the agreement relies on a carve-out that allows tax information to be used in criminal investigations, specifically targeting migrants who haven’t left the U.S. after being ordered to do so. Nina Olson, executive director of the Center for Taxpayer Rights and the former national taxpayer advocate for the IRS, called the plan “unprecedented.” A Treasury Department spokesperson defended the deal and said it’s “founded in longstanding authorities granted by Congress, which serve to protect the privacy of law-abiding Americans while streamlining the ability to pursue criminals.” I agree with critics who oppose the deal that this exception goes too far and undermines taxpayer privacy.
Immigrants who paid their taxes trusted that their records would remain confidential, separate from immigration enforcement.
A group from the NYU Tax Law Center stated that the deal “threatens to violate the rights that many more Americans have under longstanding laws that protect their tax information from wrongful disclosure or dissemination.”
“In fact, it is difficult to see how the IRS could release information to DHS while complying with taxpayer privacy statutes,” they added. “IRS officials who sign off on data sharing under these circumstances risk breaking the law, which could result in criminal and civil sanctions.”
For years, immigrants who paid their taxes through ITINs trusted that their records would remain confidential, separate from immigration enforcement. But with this new deal, the wall between tax compliance and immigration enforcement has been shattered. This breach is not only a policy failure but also a direct assault on the core American value of privacy.
That trust is now broken, and for what? To expedite an immigration enforcement agenda that already operates with little regard for due process. IRS officials resigned because they knew the damage this would cause, not just to immigrant communities, but to the integrity of the entire tax system.
Tom Bowman of the Center for Democracy & Technology said in a post about the deal: “Undocumented immigrants may stop filing their taxes altogether in order to protect themselves and their family members from efforts to deport them based on information they provide to the IRS. Additionally, U.S. citizens and legal residents in mixed-status households may avoid claiming undocumented dependents, avoid claiming certain tax credits, or stop filing taxes altogether to protect their loved ones who are undocumented.”
All this will likely lead to more misinformation, misidentifications and expanded surveillance. Immigrants already know what happens when they are swept up in an enforcement dragnet. The government is casting a wide net, all in the name of “criminal investigation,” but we’ve seen the pattern. The lines are blurry, and the consequences are severe. The idea that this data will be used only on “criminals” is hard to take seriously when the administration’s record shows a willingness to disregard basic due process.
If it can happen to immigrants, then it can happen to anyone.
The government’s use of tax records for immigration enforcement undermines the very premise of our democracy. The ability to file taxes without fear of retaliation is a cornerstone of civic participation. Once that is eroded, no one’s personal information is safe. If it can happen to immigrants, then it can happen to anyone.
That’s what’s at stake here. Immigrants, no matter their status, contribute far more than conservatives and the people running Trump’s administration like to admit, and their taxes bolster federal programs, including Social Security, even though, so long as they remain undocumented, they’ll never benefit from them. We’ve built this country on the idea of shared responsibility, and these workers have been doing their part. But now, the very system they trusted is being weaponized against them.
As Beatriz Lopez, co-executive director of the Immigration Hub, said in a scathing statement: “We continue to slip into a new era of authoritarianism in America. The digital and physical dragnets that Trump is building mean millions of immigrants—many of whom have followed the law and paid their taxes for decades—are now vulnerable to indiscriminate brutality and quiet erasure with little opportunity for redress.”
“The administration is shattering what little trust remains between immigrant communities and the government and putting critical revenue streams at risk,” she added.
When trust begins to unravel, the entire fabric of the nation follows. This isn’t about just immigrants’ rights. It’s about all of our rights. If this breach goes unchecked, we all lose. The integrity of our system is on the line, and the damage will reverberate throughout every corner of society, no matter your immigration status.
