DC Circuit rules IRS data sharing plan with ICE unlawful

A D.C. Circuit panel upheld a ruling that the IRS's data-sharing arrangement with ICE was unlawful, after the tax agency turned over more than 47,000 taxpayer address records under a procedure that let ICE submit requests without providing addresses, sometimes literally typing 'Don't Care' or '00000' as placeholders. Judge Cornelia Pillard wrote that the law, passed after Watergate specifically to prevent this kind of abuse, requires ICE to identify a specific taxpayer under investigation and a specific official directly involved in that investigation.

Instead, the same ICE contact person was listed on requests covering 1.28 million taxpayers at once, which the district court called facially implausible as evidence of individualized investigation. The panel rejected the government's argument that one officer could screen millions of disclosures, noting the data the IRS handed over didn't even include the dates needed to check who was still in the country.

The IRS is now on notice for a second time from the same appellate court about the same legal defect.

The full dispatch is available from the source below.