Trump’s Lawsuit Against the IRS Is Even More Outrageous Than It Seems

You don’t know the half of it.

Last week Donald Trump filed suit against the IRS, demanding $10 billion in compensation for the unauthorized disclosure of his taxes in September 2020. 

Oftentimes a news story will seem outrageous at first glance but, on closer inspection, will become less outrageous, or perhaps not outrageous at all. On such occasions, it’s the duty of a sober journal of opinion like The New Republic to set the record straight. 

This is not one such occasion. 

Rather, this is a story that, the more you dig into the details, the more outrageous it becomes. News coverage has actually failed to capture fully how very stupid this lawsuit is. I have now reviewed the relevant documents and can attest that, even for Trump, this lawsuit is an outlier. It’s batshit crazy.

And now, I’ll be happy to take your questions.

So Griffin’s lawsuit was the dry run for Trump’s. What happened?

The case was more or less thrown out of court. Griffin filed his lawsuit in 2022 and reached a puny settlement with the IRS in 2024. In the settlement, Griffin received no money; the IRS apologized. It was a complete waste of Griffin’s time and lawyer’s fees. 

I can’t resist voicing my disappointment that the IRS apology didn’t say the following: “We are sorry there was an unauthorized disclosure that showed Ken Griffin paid a scandalously low average effective income tax rate of 29.2 percent when Griffin was the fourth-highest paid human in the United States.” The apology just said the IRS “failed to prevent Mr. Littlejohn’s criminal conduct,” that it was working hard to prevent such disclosures in the future, et cetera.

In his lawsuit, Griffin demanded $1,000 for every unauthorized disclosure of his tax returns, including subsequent disclosures. Trump’s demand for $10 billion follows the same formula, which according to Trump’s complaint works out to $10 billion. But again: Griffin didn’t get a dime. You’d think that would discourage Trump. Maybe nobody told him. (Trump deals harshly with subordinates who deliver bad news.)

Why did Griffin settle? 

Because the judge tossed out Griffin’s claim that the IRS violated the 1974 Privacy Act, on the grounds that Griffin (net worth: $51 billion) couldn’t show he suffered pecuniary harm. Trump’s lawsuit similarly claims that the IRS violated the Privacy Act. But since the Times published his tax data, Trump’s net worth has more than tripled to $6.5 billion. That should make it very difficult for Trump to show pecuniary harm.