Former President Donald Trump filed a federal lawsuit Thursday in Miami seeking at least $10 billion in damages, accusing the Internal Revenue Service and the U.S. Department of the Treasury of failing to prevent a former IRS contractor from leaking his tax returns to news outlets.
Trump, suing in his personal capacity, claims the IRS had a duty to safeguard his tax returns and properly vet employees but “failed to take such mandatory precautions,” causing harm to him, his sons Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, and the Trump Organization.
Allegations of Reputational and Financial Harm
The lawsuit asserts that the agencies’ alleged negligence resulted in “reputational and financial harm, public embarrassment, unfairly tarnished business reputations, and negative effects on public standing” for the plaintiffs. Trump said the alleged failures inflicted “significant and irreparable harm” on both personal and corporate interests.
The case follows the October 2023 guilty plea of former IRS contractor Charles Littlejohn, who admitted to stealing tax information from Trump and thousands of other wealthy Americans, disclosing it to The New York Times and ProPublica. Littlejohn, employed through Booz Allen Hamilton, was sentenced in January 2024 to five years in prison and has appealed his sentence to the D.C. Circuit.
