Senior GOP Senator Asked Watchdog to Report After ‘Whistleblower’ Action at IRS – By Mariam Baksh (Nextgov) / May 23, 2022
The request of the watchdog agency followed the release of confidential information leading to a detailed news report of how the mega rich avoid paying taxes.
Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Mike Crapo, R-Idaho, responded to an investigation revealing tactics the super wealthy use to evade income taxes by asking the Government Accountability Office to report on how the Internal Revenue Service protects filers’ information.
“Recent news reported on tax return information and stated that the news organization had a large amount of IRS tax data on certain types of taxpayers. In light of this, you asked us to review IRS’s policies for protecting tax information,” reads the May 19 watchdog report titled “Characteristics of Employee Unauthorized Access and Disclosure Cases.” GAO identified Crapo as the congressional requester.
The news report referenced in GAO’s footnotes is an expose ProPublica published last summer using tax information from individuals like Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and Michael Bloomberg to highlight patterns—including a “buy, borrow, die” strategy—that allows those with sufficient means to enjoy an affluent lifestyle while sometimes paying no federal income taxes at all.
