WASHINGTON (AP) – President Donald Trump has filed a lawsuit against the IRS and the Treasury Department, seeking $10 billion in damages. The lawsuit, which was submitted in a federal court in Florida, accuses the federal agencies of failing to prevent a leak of the president's tax information to various news outlets during the years 2018 to 2020. The lawsuit also names Trump’s sons, Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr., along with the Trump Organization as plaintiffs.
The suit claims that the leak of confidential tax records belonging to Trump and his organization caused significant “reputational and financial harm, public embarrassment, and unfairly tarnished their business reputations." Additionally, it asserts that the leak portrayed them in a false light and adversely affected President Trump as well as the other plaintiffs' public standing.
In a related development, a former IRS contractor named Charles Edward Littlejohn from Washington, D.C., was sentenced to five years in prison in 2024 after pleading guilty to leaking tax information about Trump and other high-profile individuals to news organizations. Littlejohn, who worked for Booz Allen Hamilton, a firm specializing in defense and national security technology, provided sensitive data to The New York Times and ProPublica, resulting in what prosecutors described as leaks “unparalleled in the IRS’s history.” The public disclosures violated IRS Code 6103, which is known for its stringent confidentiality provisions.
Reports indicated that The New York Times highlighted in 2020 that Trump had not paid federal income tax for numerous years leading up to 2020, while ProPublica published articles in 2021 that pointed out discrepancies in Trump’s tax records. Additionally, a total of six years of Trump’s tax returns were eventually released by the then-Democratically controlled House Ways and Means Committee.
Trump's lawsuit specifically states that Littlejohn's disclosures to news organizations inflicted reputational and financial harm on the plaintiffs and adversely impacted President Trump's support among voters during the 2020 presidential election. Notably, Littlejohn was found to have illegally accessed and leaked tax records of several other billionaires, including notable figures like Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk.
Further, the lawsuit comes in the wake of the U.S. Treasury Department's announcement that it had terminated its contracts with Booz Allen Hamilton shortly before the filing. This decision followed the criminal charges against Littlejohn for leaking taxpayer information affecting thousands of the nation’s wealthiest individuals, including President Trump. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent criticized the firm for “failing to implement adequate safeguards to protect sensitive data,” emphasizing the inadequacies that allowed confidential taxpayer information to be compromised through their contracts with the IRS.
The representatives from the White House, Treasury, and IRS were not immediately available for comments regarding the lawsuit or the issues raised by it.
Fatima Hussein, The Associated Press
