On Wednesday, it was revealed that the Trump administration has withheld the release of an annual IRS report that would show how Republicans’ 2025 tax cuts affected millions of Americans’ taxes. According to Politico, the delayed release is “unusual,” suggesting that it may contain “less-than-flattering” data the GOP doesn’t want voters to see before the midterms.
As Politico explains, the report details “which tax breaks were claimed by people in different income brackets, as well as information like how much they paid in taxes. The IRS typically releases the data in the wake of each filing season, but this year’s rollout is more anticipated because it’s expected to provide the first detailed look at how taxpayers are taking advantage of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, including its new deductions for overtime wages and tipped income. The data was scheduled to be released in July, and then updated again in September, as the IRS processed more people’s returns —but the agency hasn’t published either. The IRS said it is awaiting approval from the Treasury Department to publish the figures. But the delay has already irked some who complain it is part of a pattern of the administration withholding otherwise routine releases of tax data.”
What’s more, notes Politico, “The lack of detailed numbers on the 2026 filing season comes as the agency is also under fire for withholding a periodic report on the so-called tax gap, which is the share of taxes owed but not yet paid.”
“I think they are hiding stuff that doesn’t line up with all the crowing the CEO has been doing,” Nina Olson, a former national taxpayer advocate, said of Frank Bisignano, the IRS’s day-to-day leader who has joined Republican lawmakers in touting the breaks to voters.
While the administration hyped IRS figures earlier in the year claiming they showed the benefits of the tax cuts, according to Politico, “the delayed data is far more granular, showing the uptake of individual provisions in the code as well as things like how much more people in different income groups reported earning, and how many people still owed money to the IRS at the time of filing.” These figures have caused problems for the majority party before. For example, Republicans took heat when the figures released the first year after their 2017 tax cuts showed fewer people taking deductions for charitable contributions.
As Barry Johnson, a former top IRS official, explained to Politico, it’s possible this year’s figures include less-than-flattering details about Republicans’ tax cuts — they could show the tax burden shifting between income groups, for instance, or a suspicious number of people claiming specific breaks. He noted that the Treasury isn’t supposed to be blocking the release of the figures due to a law President Donald Trump signed in his first term that gave statistical agencies, like the IRS, more power to decide when to publish data. “By law, the IRS determines what they release and when it gets released,” said Johnson. “Treasury shouldn’t have a role in determining the timing of any statistical release. It’s unusual.”