Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

When it comes to dealing with the federal government, there are few things more frightening for Tennesseans and Americans than an IRS audit. For many, the time-consuming ordeal means sleepless nights, financial uncertainty, and needless harassment – especially for hardworking taxpayers. In fact, as of last year, nearly two-thirds of IRS audits targeted Americans making less than $200,000.

Yet, in a misguided effort to fund the Biden-Harris administration’s trillions in inflationary spending, the IRS recently doubled down on its pledge to ramp up audits on American taxpayers.

All the time I hear from small business owners, farmers, and independent contractors across our state who are worried about being targeted by the agency, which received $80 billion from the Biden-Harris “Inflation Reduction Act” to hire 87,000 new employees.

While IRS Commissioner Werfel recently promised that there will be “no new wave of audits coming from middle- and low-income” Americans, a new report from the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration confirms that Tennesseans have every reason to be concerned.

Although the Treasury Department directed the IRS to exclude Americans making less than $400,000 each year from increased audit rates, the report found that the IRS has no plan to ensure this happens.

The agency, for example, is using a novel definition of taxpayers’ earnings – “total positive income” – that has no statutory definition. According to the IRS, the term refers to “the sum of all positive amounts shown for the various sources of income reported on an individual income tax return and, thus, excludes losses.”

To be sure, this confusing definition raises more questions than it answers: Will a small business owner or farmer be subject to more audits, for example, if his revenue exceeds $400,000, even if his profit is much less than that? Will a married couple with a household income of $400,000 face the same audit rate as a single person with the same income?

For months, on the Senate Finance Committee, I have pressed Commissioner Werfel and other Biden-Harris officials for answers, but time and again they have failed to provide satisfactory explanations.

While disturbing, this lack of clarity should come as no surprise: The IG report found that internally the IRS has failed to define “small business” under the directive and develop a methodology for enforcing the $400,000 threshold, while lacking basic documentation and transparency about its auditing plan.

In short: the Biden-Harris IRS is preparing to shake down Main Street – all while claiming to focus on tax cheats and millionaires.

No doubt, the IRS’s audit plan is just the latest example of the administration’s disastrous tax-and-spend agenda, which has seen our national debt increase by more than $7 trillion while pushing up prices across the board by 20 percent in less than four years.

Unlike Washington Democrats, Senate Republicans understand that hardworking Tennesseans and Americans do best when they have more money in their pocketbook – not less.

That’s why, on the Senate Finance Committee, I am working to make the Trump tax cuts permanent, including provisions like R&D, bonus depreciation, and the business interest deduction, which have done so much to spur growth and investment in our state.

To rein in the Biden-Harris administration’s reckless, inflationary spending, I’ve also introduced legislation to slash federal spending by 1 percent, 2 percent, and 5 percent for non-defense and non-Social Security items.

Now more than ever, Washington should support hardworking taxpayers, not harass them. With its reckless audit plan, the Biden-Harris IRS is doing just the opposite.

(Marsha Blackburn represents Tennessee in the United States Senate.)