Court filing details memorandum allowing Homeland Security to request address data amid ongoing legal challenge.
By yourNEWS Media Newsroom
The Internal Revenue Service shared last known address information for more than 47,000 taxpayers with the Department of Homeland Security for use in immigration enforcement efforts, according to newly filed court documents.
In a sworn declaration submitted Wednesday, IRS Chief Risk and Control Officer Dottie Romo confirmed that the agency provided 47,289 last known addresses to federal immigration officials under a memorandum of understanding signed last year between the Treasury Department and DHS. The agreement permits Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to request names and addresses of individuals suspected of being in the United States illegally.
According to the filing, DHS requested address information for approximately 1.28 million people under the memorandum. The IRS located and provided tens of thousands of addresses in response.
Romo stated in her declaration that on Jan. 23 the IRS asked DHS to take steps to “prevent the disclosure or dissemination, and to ensure appropriate disposal, of any data provided to ICE by IRS based on incomplete or insufficient address information.” She said the agency also sought DHS assistance in “promptly taking steps to remediate the matter consistent with federal law,” including “appropriate disposal of any data provided to ICE by IRS based on incomplete or insufficient address information.”
“DHS and ICE have confirmed to Treasury and IRS that they will comply with federal law and the MOU in addressing this data issue,” Romo wrote. “DHS and ICE further confirmed that pending the resolution of a related injunction enjoining the MOU, DHS and ICE will not inspect, view, use, copy, distribute, rely on, or otherwise act on any return information that has been obtained from or disclosed by IRS pursuant to the MOU.”
Under the April agreement, the Department of Justice previously argued that the memorandum “signed by the Department of the Treasury and DHS reiterates the agencies’ commitment to sharing information only in the way” permitted by law. In response to litigation filed by immigration advocacy groups seeking to block the agreement, the Justice Department stated, “As laid out in the MOU, DHS can legally request return information relating to individuals under criminal investigation, and the IRS must provide it.”
For years, the IRS has allowed individuals without legal status to file income tax returns using individual taxpayer identification numbers. In a 2024 report, the Bipartisan Policy Center estimated that illegal immigrants have contributed approximately $25.7 billion in taxes to Social Security, including through the use of borrowed or invalid Social Security numbers.
Following the court disclosure, a DHS spokesperson said in a statement that the data sharing reflects broader interagency cooperation on immigration enforcement.
“Information sharing across agencies is essential to identify who is in our country, including violent criminals, determine what public safety and terror threats may exist so we can neutralize them, scrub these individuals from voter rolls, and identify what public benefits these aliens are using at taxpayer expense,” the spokesperson said.
Since taking office last year, President Donald Trump has prioritized large-scale deportations, a policy he emphasized throughout his 2024 campaign.
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