Trump Administration’s Decision to End Direct File is Another Gift to Big Corporations
news releaseContact: Jon Whiten ([email protected])
According to multiple reports, the Trump administration plans to eliminate the IRS Direct File program, a free electronic system for filing tax returns directly to the agency.
Statement from ITEP Executive Director Amy Hanauer
“The tax preparation industry has for years lobbied to prevent the IRS from providing a tool to allow Americans to file their taxes online for free. President Trump and Elon Musk have now caved to that lobbying and plan to shut down the free-file service that let some taxpayers file their taxes for free. This program was poised to be available nationwide and was deemed ‘borderline miraculous‘ by The Atlantic. Ending Direct File is another gift from this administration to large corporations, this time to the multibillion-dollar tax prep industry that wants to make money off of you filing your taxes. Destroying public services to ramp up private profits hurts taxpayers, hurts revenue, and costs more. This is yet another piece to the ongoing attack on the IRS at the benefit of the wealthy and exploitative tax preparers.”
More on Direct File
The IRS opened its free tax filing service to every state for the 2025 tax filing season. Direct File was made possible by President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act, which provided new resources for the IRS to improve customer service and ensure taxpayers claim the benefits and deductions for which they are eligible. For the 2024 tax filing season, the IRS made a pilot program for Direct File available to taxpayers in 12 states — Arizona, California, Florida, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, Nevada, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Washington, and Wyoming.
Hundreds of thousands of Americans used the IRS Direct File tool to file their taxes this year, and the program received overwhelmingly high marks and near-unanimous satisfaction from users.