Senate Finance Republicans: IRS Document Destruction Harmed Taxpayers

Press Release

"Recently reported information demonstrates the Internal Revenue Service's (IRS) March 2021 decision to destroy 30 million unprocessed tax year 2019 taxpayer information returns has indisputably harmed taxpayers.

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For example, one of the recent reports provides troubling evidence of specific taxpayers who were directly harmed by the destruction of these information returns. For these taxpayers, the IRS denied their earned income tax credit (EITC) claim based upon the mistaken belief that the taxpayers had insufficient earned income.

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Meanwhile, the IRS still officially maintains that "[t]here were no negative taxpayer consequences as a result of this action.'

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[However], it appears that "relief' was not provided by the IRS to at least some, and potentially thousands of, taxpayers who claimed the EITC in 2019; the destruction of these unprocessed information returns was unnecessary and its direct and indirect harm is disproportionate to whatever storage costs the IRS would have incurred; to date, the IRS is systemically denying/challenging EITC claims that rely upon income reported by these destroyed information returns rather than evaluating documentation in each case; and the IRS has not responded to diverse substantive issues arising from this episode."

Source