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Theo Jorden
A sitting president is suing a government agency he controls for $10 billion and his own Justice Department is now considering settling that lawsuit and potentially writing him a cheque. The legal, ethical, and constitutional alarms ringing across Washington are deafening. The story began not in 2026 but years earlier, with one of the largest
A sitting president is suing a government agency he controls for $10 billion and his own Justice Department is now considering settling that lawsuit and potentially writing him a cheque. The legal, ethical, and constitutional alarms ringing across Washington are deafening.
The story began not in 2026 but years earlier, with one of the largest data breaches in IRS history. Charles Littlejohn, a former IRS contractor, leaked 15 years of Donald Trump’s tax returns to The New York Times between 2019 and 2020, revealing that Trump paid just $750 in federal income taxes in both 2016 and 2017. Littlejohn also leaked tax records of approximately 7,600 of the wealthiest Americans to ProPublica, enabling a landmark investigation into how the ultra-rich pay little or no taxes.
In 2023, Littlejohn pleaded guilty and was sentenced. He is currently serving his sentence at Federal Correctional Institution, Marion, with a release date of October 2027. The leaker is behind bars. But the lawsuit he inspired is now threatening to become something far more alarming than the original leak.
On January 29, 2026, President Trump filed a $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS and the US Treasury, alleging the agencies failed to prevent the unauthorised disclosure of his tax information. The suit was filed in federal court, with Trump as the plaintiff the same Trump who, as president, oversees the very agencies he is suing.
In April 2026, Trump’s attorneys asked a federal judge to pause the case for 90 days to allow both sides to explore a resolution. The IRS an agency under Trump’s executive authority consented. That consent itself raised eyebrows. A government agency agreeing to pause litigation at the personal request of the president who controls it is not standard legal procedure. It is a signal of what critics call a fundamental collapse of institutional independence.
Then on May 13, CNN, Al Jazeera, and multiple outlets reported that the Department of Justice also under Trump’s control is actively discussing whether to settle the case in the coming days, ahead of a May 20 court deadline. Three people familiar with the deliberations confirmed the discussions. The settlement under review could involve the IRS dropping all active audits of Trump, his family members, and his businesses. A cash payment to Trump himself has not been ruled out.
Legal experts have identified multiple layers of constitutional and statutory violations that any settlement would risk.
The most direct is the Domestic Emoluments Clause of the US Constitution, which prohibits the president from receiving any payment from the United States government beyond the compensation set by Congress. If Trump’s Justice Department settles a lawsuit by directing taxpayer funds to Trump personally, it would represent precisely the kind of presidential self-enrichment the Framers designed the Emoluments Clause to prevent.
Then there is Section 7217 of the tax code, which makes it unlawful for the president or any employee of the Executive Office to directly or indirectly request that the IRS terminate any ongoing audit or investigation of any taxpayer. Violation carries a criminal penalty of up to five years imprisonment and/or a $5,000 fine. A settlement that includes dropping IRS audits of Trump’s businesses would appear to trigger precisely this prohibition.
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) and Public Citizen filed a joint amicus brief warning courts that Trump’s lawsuit raises “significant constitutional and ethical concerns” because the president appears on both sides of the litigation as plaintiff seeking money and as the executive overseeing the defendant agencies. CREW filed Inspector General complaints with both the Treasury IG and IRS IG, calling for independent investigation into whether the process has been improperly influenced.
Democratic lawmakers have moved quickly and loudly. Senators Ron Wyden and Elizabeth Warren sent a formal demand for answers to the Treasury and DOJ in February, warning that Trump was attempting to “steal $10 billion from taxpayers.” Warren called any DOJ settlement before a court ruling a “massive, unprecedented scandal.”
A House Democrat went further, warning that a settlement would represent the “largest single act of grand larceny in American history” a president using the executive branch he controls to extract a $10 billion payment from the public purse for a grievance stemming from his first term.
The Tax Law Center issued a formal statement saying the settlement process risks violating laws protecting against political interference in tax administration a norm that has underpinned public trust in the IRS for decades.
The IRS settlement story is unfolding against the backdrop of an administration already under maximum scrutiny: a US Iran war costing $2 billion per day, gas prices at $4.50 per gallon, inflation at a three-year high of 3.8%, and a president whose approval rating has sunk to 34%. The optics of simultaneously asking American households to absorb the economic pain of the Israel-Iran war while potentially directing $10 billion in public funds to the president personally are politically explosive.
The man who leaked Trump’s tax returns is in prison. The president whose taxes were leaked is potentially about to receive a $10 billion settlement from the government he leads. For legal scholars, ethics watchdogs, and opposition lawmakers, that is not justice. That is the conflict of interest made law.
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