The IRS plan to expose data on undocumented workers threatens nearly $100 billion in tax collections

5 ICE officers (Credit: Hyoung Chang/The Denver Post)

• A proposal to share the IRS’s historically closely guarded data with immigration authorities will make immigrants far less likely to pay taxes in the future, experts say. Undocumented immigrants paid $97 billion in federal and state taxes in 2022, and many have filed tax returns in hopes of bolstering their case to eventually gain legal residency.

In its push to deport record numbers of immigrants, the Trump administration is reportedly on the verge of accessing some of the most closely guarded data in America: taxpayers’ returns. The unprecedented move could threaten tens of billions of dollars in tax revenue as it casts a chill on taxpayer compliance, experts say.