House Ways and Means Democrats pressed Frank Bisignano, who leads both the IRS and Social Security Administration, on data access concerns at both agencies in his first testimony on Capitol Hill since he took on his newly created role at the tax agency.
Throughout the nearly five-hour hearing Wednesday, Democrats frequently seized on a ruling last week from a federal judge that found the IRS broke the law in improperly disclosing and sharing more than 42,000 taxpayer addresses with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. But Bisignano repeatedly declined to answer questions about the case, citing ongoing litigation.
U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly of the District of Columbia wrote in the ruling that the IRS broke the law “approximately 42,695 times.” ICE asked the IRS for 1.28 million taxpayer records last summer under a memorandum of understanding, and a ruling on the legality of the disclosure is being appealed.
