Elon Musk and his unofficial DOGE (Department of Government Efficiency) are trying to gain access to IRS taxpayer data, a move that pushes legal limits.
DOGE has been targeting several government agencies, gutting them in an effort to rein in spending. The Internal Revenue Server appears to be its latest target, with The Washington Post reporting that DOGE is asking for broad access to IRS data, including highly sensitive taxpayer data and tax returns.
The data in question includes the Integrated Data Retrieval System (IDRS), which provides a mechanism for IRS employees to access the agency’s most sensitive and private taxpayer data. Access to IDRS is carefully regulated, with federal law only allowing access under very specific circumstances.
- Law enforcement can only access the data with a court order.
- IRS and Treasury Department employees can only access the data for purposes related to audits, collections, tax enforcement, revenue collection, and some administration functions.
- Even lawmakers cannot access the data.
According to The Guardian, the White House defended its efforts to give DOGE access under the guise of rooting out fraud.
“Waste, fraud and abuse have been deeply entrenched in our broken system for far too long,” said White House spokesperson Harrison Fields. “It takes direct access to the system to identify and fix it.”
What the White House did not explain is how looking at taxpayers’ private data will reveal “waste, fraud and abuse.”
Despite the lack of a good reason for DOGE to be accessing IDRS, the Post reports that the agency “is considering a memorandum of understanding” that would give DOGE broad access.
The Legal Questions
One of the biggest questions many have is whether it is even legal for DOGE to access taxpayer data. Senators Ron Wyden and Elizabeth Warren have written to Acting IRS Commissioner Douglas O’Donnell demanding information regarding giving DOGE access.
As you are aware, tax returns and return information are subject to strong legal privacy protections under Sections 6103 and 7213A of the tax code.2 These laws were strengthened nearly 50 years ago with strong bipartisan majorities of Congress in response to President Nixon’s abuse of the IRS to target his political enemies. These reforms also included prohibitions on executive branch influence over taxpayer audits and other investigations. 3 These prohibitions have long prevented political appointees in previous administrations from accessing the private tax records of hundreds of millions of Americans, and allowing DOGE officials sweeping access these systems may be in violation of these statutes. Violations of these taxpayer privacy laws, including unauthorized access to or disclosure of tax returns and return information, can result in criminal penalties, including incarceration. In one recent example, a contractor working for the IRS who leaked taxpayer information was sentenced in 2024 to five years in federal prison.
While Section 6103 of the tax code prohibits any unauthorized disclosure of tax returns or information contained in tax returns, Section 7213A also makes it unlawful for any federal officer, employee, or authorized viewer to willfully inspect a return or return information for a purpose other than one specifically authorized by law, with inspection defined expansively, to include “any examination of a return or return information.”5 Therefore, improper inspection of tax return information is illegal, even if it has not been made public or disclosed to any unauthorized recipients.
Even if individuals affiliated with DOGE are employed by Treasury, their access to tax information may not be legal. For inspection of taxpayer information to be lawful, it must be made to or by an authorized person for an authorized purpose. While Treasury employees, such as IRS personnel, can access tax return information for their official duties involving tax administration, such as conducting audits or processing tax returns, they generally may not access them for reasons unrelated to those purposes. In addition, there are significant restrictions on access to tax return information for others in the employ of the federal government. There are serious statutory and regulatory restrictions on when employees outside the Treasury Department may gain access to tax return information. To date, no information on DOGE employees or any others executing orders on Musk’s behalf have revealed any clear, stated purpose as to why they need access to return information, whether they have followed all required laws to gain access to IRS systems, and what steps the IRS has taken to ensure that inspection of tax return is contained to authorized personnel and not disclosed to any unauthorized parties.
The two senators also directly address the legality of whether an executive order is enough to grant DOGE access.
No executive order requiring agency heads to provide DOGE personnel access to IRS records or information technology systems supersedes the federal tax code. Software engineers working for Musk seeking to gain access to tax return information have no right to hoover up taxpayer data and send that data back to any other part of the federal government and may be breaking the law if they are doing so. DOGE engineers also have no legal right to snoop around and inspect the tax returns of millions of American citizens unless expressly permitted under Section 6103.
The senators’ full letter can be read here and dives into even greater details about the legal implications.
Ethical Concerns
In addition to the strictly legal issues are the ethical questions raised by giving DOGE access. For example, the IRS’ own Taxpayer Bill of Rights assures taxpayers that this kind of scenario will not happen.
The Right to Privacy
Taxpayers have the right to expect that any IRS inquiry, examination, or enforcement action will comply with the law and be no more intrusive than necessary, and will respect all due process rights, including search and seizure protections and will provide, where applicable, a collection due process hearing.
Learn more about your right to privacy.
The Right to Confidentiality
Taxpayers have the right to expect that any information they provide to the IRS will not be disclosed unless authorized by the taxpayer or by law. Taxpayers have the right to expect appropriate action will be taken against employees, return preparers, and others who wrongfully use or disclose taxpayer return information.
Given the number of government websites that have had information purged, below is a screenshot of the sections in question.
Conclusion
DOGE’s request to access Americans’ most private and sensitive data is a disturbing turn of events, one that has not been clearly explained and is likely in direction violation of the law. The revelation is even more concerning when considering previous reports that indicate DOGE is guilty of embarrassing lapses in cybersecurity, meaning their access to IRS data could open the door to an unprecedented avalanche of cybersecurity breaches.
Observers are also questioning why an administration that promised to reign in Big Tech has seemingly handed the keys of the kingdom to one of Big Tech’s most controversial executives and is now on the verge of handing over Americans’ most sensitive and private data to that same tech mogul.
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