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President Donald Trump on Thursday sued the Internal Revenue Service and the Treasury Department for $10 billion, alleging the agencies failed to take required steps to prevent a former IRS employee from improperly disclosing his tax returns, along with those of his sons and the Trump Organization, to news outlets.
The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Miami, says Trump is suing in his personal capacity, not as president. The other plaintiffs include his sons Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, as well as the Trump Organization.
“Defendants have caused Plaintiffs reputational and financial harm, public embarrassment, unfairly tarnished their business reputations, portrayed them in a false light, and negatively affected President Trump, and the other Plaintiffs’ public standing,” the complaint states.
Background of the tax leak
The lawsuit stems from the actions of Charles Littlejohn, a former IRS contractor who was sentenced in 2024 to five years in prison after pleading guilty the year before to leaking Trump’s tax records to The New York Times.
In 2020, the newspaper published reporting showing Trump paid only $750 in federal income taxes in both 2016 and 2017. Trump at the time dismissed the reporting as “totally fake news” and said the information had been “illegally obtained.”
Littlejohn later admitted in federal court that he also stole tax records belonging to thousands of other wealthy individuals in 2019 and 2020, including billionaires Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk.
IRS response and security measures
Following Littlejohn’s sentencing, the IRS issued a statement in 2024 calling his conduct “unacceptable” and said it had notified affected taxpayers.
“It bears noting that the IRS has taken aggressive action more generally to enhance data security — to ensure, to the fullest extent feasible, that nothing like the Littlejohn incident can happen in the future,” the agency said at the time.
Trump’s lawsuit argues those measures came too late and that the government failed to protect confidential taxpayer information as required by law.
Unusual legal posture
The case places Trump in the rare position of suing agencies within his own administration. Last year, Trump publicly said he was seeking “a lot of money” from the federal government related to past investigations into him.
In October, The New York Times reported that Trump was seeking $230 million in damages from the Justice Department over prior probes. Asked about that figure, Trump replied, “it could be.”
Trump also acknowledged the unusual optics of approving any settlement involving himself.
“It’s awfully strange to make a decision where I’m paying myself,” Trump said at the time, adding that he would donate any payout to charity or use it “to the White House while we restore the White House.”
The White House and the Trump Organization did not immediately respond Thursday night to questions about the IRS lawsuit or what Trump would do with any damages awarded.
The case is expected to raise significant legal questions about government liability for taxpayer data breaches and the scope of damages available under federal privacy laws.
