The Trump administration pushes to halve the IRS workforce by half

The Internal Revenue Service is preparing to lose up to 50% of its staff, according to four people familiar with the question, a significant reduction which could compromise the agency’s capacity to complete its basic mission to collect taxes.

The IRS started the Trump administration with around 100,000 employees. He has already dismissed more than 7,000 people who had recently joined the agency and had fewer employment protections, and thousands of others took Elon Musk’s offer to resign. These cuts, as well as normal attrition, should count towards the Trump administration’s objective to halve the number of people working in IRS, two of the people said.

The Trump administration has prepared “reduction of force” plans for government agencies as part of the next phase of its efforts to quickly reduce the federal workforce. It is not known how fast the next batch of endings could take place at the IRS and how they will affect specific departments there. The tax collector is reviewing the American income statements as part of the annual deposit season, and the officials have delayed certain layoffs until the end of the period in the spring.

An IRS spokesperson refused to comment.

The loss of half of its employees would seriously attach the IRS, which has struggled for years to hire and conservation of a workforce which can deal with millions of income tax declarations each year and make complex audits. Americans may have to wait any longer to receive reimbursements or speak with IRS employees in future seasons, while companies and rich Americans could be less exposed to the barely personal tax agency.

The effort to reduce the costs of Mr. Musk, the Ministry of Effectiveness of the Government, has lived the interest of the IRS in recent weeks, with two of its representatives, Gavin Kliger and Sam Corcos, working from his headquarters in Washington, according to familiar people. They have been the subject of access to agency databases, in particular, more recently, which has information on agency entrepreneurs.

The leadership of the IRS was in the troubles, two leaders moving under Mr. Trump. The current acting commissioner, Melanie Krause, placed the head of the human capital at IRS on administrative leave this week, according to two people familiar with the issue.