Trump Files $10 Billion Lawsuit Against IRS Over Leaked Tax Returns
President Donald J. Trump has filed a sweeping $10 billion lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service, accusing the agency of unlawfully leaking his private tax returns in what his legal team describes as a politically motivated and unprecedented violation of federal privacy laws.
The lawsuit, filed Monday in federal court, alleges that the IRS failed to properly safeguard Trump’s confidential financial records, which were later published by The New York Times and ProPublica. According to the complaint, a “rogue, politically motivated” IRS contractor deliberately accessed and disclosed sensitive tax information involving Trump, his family, and the Trump Organization.
At the center of the case is Charles Littlejohn, a former IRS contractor who pleaded guilty in 2023 to a single felony count of unauthorized disclosure of tax return information. Littlejohn admitted to stealing and leaking Trump’s tax records to The New York Times and disclosing confidential tax data belonging to thousands of wealthy individuals to ProPublica.
Littlejohn is currently serving a five-year federal prison sentence. Trump’s lawsuit notes that Littlejohn testified during a 2024 deposition that the materials he leaked included detailed information about all of Trump’s business holdings. Trump’s attorneys argue that the disclosures violated federal law, caused significant reputational harm, and breached the privacy rights of hundreds of thousands of taxpayers.
The complaint further alleges that the IRS and the Justice Department under the previous administration failed to pursue appropriate charges against Littlejohn. Despite publicly describing his actions as “unparalleled in the IRS’s history,” prosecutors in 2023 allowed Littlejohn to plead guilty to just one felony count.
That decision drew sharp criticism from congressional Republicans, who accused the Biden-Harris Justice Department of offering an inexplicably lenient plea deal. House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan sent multiple oversight letters to the Justice Department, questioning why prosecutors declined to pursue multiple felony charges despite the scope of the breach.
In one letter, Jordan wrote that the Justice Department “failed to ensure full accountability for criminal conduct that was unprecedented in its scope and scale,” noting that the stolen data allegedly included tax returns and financial information for approximately 18,000 individuals and 73,000 businesses.
During Littlejohn’s sentencing, the federal judge overseeing the case reportedly called the plea agreement “perplexing” and “troubling,” stating that she had “no words” for the fact that Littlejohn faced only a single felony count despite the magnitude of the leak.
After President Trump returned to office, the IRS provided new information to Congress revealing that more than 405,000 taxpayers were affected by the breach, with roughly 89 percent of them being business entities. That disclosure raised fresh questions about whether the extent of the leak had been deliberately minimized by the prior administration.
Trump’s lawsuit seeks $10 billion in damages, citing harm to his business interests, family members, and associates whose financial data was exposed. His legal team argues that the federal government failed to implement adequate safeguards and oversight and that the leak was driven by political animus.
“The President and countless other Americans were victims of one of the most egregious data breaches in the history of the federal government,” Trump spokesman Steven Cheung said in a statement. “This was not an accident — it was a politically driven attack designed to embarrass and damage a sitting president and his family.”
The IRS declined to comment on the litigation, citing agency policy.
The New York Times published a series of reports between 2020 and 2021 examining Trump’s tax history, while ProPublica released an investigation based on leaked IRS data involving wealthy Americans. Both outlets said they received the information from an anonymous source, with federal investigators later identifying Littlejohn following a multi-year probe.
Legal experts have suggested the lawsuit may face procedural hurdles, as federal agencies are often shielded from large civil liability claims. Trump’s attorneys counter that the case falls squarely under the Privacy Act and applicable federal tort statutes due to what they describe as intentional and grossly negligent misconduct by federal employees and contractors.