Dem
47
GOP
53
They're dropping like flies. In theory, the commissioner of internal revenue is not a political position. He or she is supposed to enforce the tax laws Congress has passed and collect the revenue associated with them. In practice, with finite resources, they have to make political decisions, like "Do we focus on catching billionaires who cheat on their taxes or on small business owners who cheat on their taxes?" Additionally, presidents are sometimes tempted to use the IRS to punish their political enemies, and it takes a strong commissioner to resist. There is also the usual bureaucratic infighting. As a consequence of all of this, Donald Trump just fired his third IRS commissioner, 2 days after he hired him.
Joe Biden's commissioner, Danny Werfel, had a masters in public policy, a law degree, and 20 years of government experience at the OMB and DoJ, working for presidents of both parties. This is how it is supposed to be. He resigned on Jan. 20, 2025. Trump needed someone fast, so he picked Doug O'Donnell, who is a CPA and who was commissioner for 4 months before Werfel got the job. He was a good pick as acting commissioner except that he is old and retired on Feb. 25, 2025.
Then Trump picked Melanie Krause, a registered nurse (with a Ph.D. in nursing) who had worked as inspector general at the VA and later was COO of the IRS as acting commissioner. Despite her unusual background, she was a quick study and before long was supervising 100,000 people in 500 offices. In April, Secretary of DHS Kristi Noem and Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent signed an agreement in which the IRS would turn over confidential data about immigrants to ICE. Krause knew this was illegal and resigned on April 8 rather than turn over the data.
On April 16, Trump appointed Gary Shapley Jr. as acting commissioner. Shapley has been an IRS agent since 2009. His major achievement in life was pursuing Hunter Biden and complaining that the DoJ wasn't moving fast enough in prosecuting him. Trump picked Shapley as acting commissioner on the recommendation of Elon Musk, possibly because Shapley has no management experience and probably wouldn't be very good at catching billionaire tax cheaters with high-priced lawyers. However, Trump neglected to mention this appointment to Bessent. Bessent was not amused at being presented with a big turkey in April and told Trump that Shapley had to go. On April 18, Trump listened to Bessent and fired Shapley and appointed Michael Faulkender, the current deputy secretary of the treasury, as acting commissioner. His job is going to be carrying out the 40% personnel reduction at IRS that Musk wants to push through. After all, collecting taxes is waste and abuse. This is a small sign, but Trump vetoed Musk here and sided with one of the few semi-competent cabinet officers.
You might be wondering: Why all these acting commissioners? The reason is that Trump has nominated former Missouri representative Billy Long as commissioner. Before being elected to the House in 2010, Long was an auctioneer and radio host. As a congressman, he co-sponsored a bill to abolish the income tax (and the IRS) and replace it with a 23% national sales tax. In 2022, he ran for the Senate and lost the primary to now-Sen. Eric Schmidt (R-MO). In 2023 he became a salesman for a somewhat shady consulting company that advises clients to apply for certain iffy tax credits and then takes a cut of the savings. The IRS warned people about this scam. After 6 months, Long quit and became a realtor. Werfel he is not.
Nevertheless, his Senate confirmation hearing hasn't happened yet, probably because Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) knows how unqualified Long is and is worried that, at the very least, the Democrats will make that clear to the country during the hearing. At the very worst, he might be worried that Democrats might campaign in 2026 on "Trump appointed a sleazy fool to run the IRS so Elon Musk won't have to pay any taxes." Of course, Trump could withdraw the nomination and go with Faulkender, who has a Ph.D. in Finance from Northwestern and was assistant secretary of the treasury during Trump v1.0. Maybe that is what Thune is hoping.
Before Trump v2.0 began, one thing many people predicted that has come true is that there would be chaos, just as in Trump v1.0. (V)