This past month, I received thousands of calls, letters, and emails from people, banks and businesses around Wyoming concerning a new proposed IRS reporting requirement. This proposal would force banks to report every transaction their customers make over $600 to the IRS.
People in Wyoming are angry about this gross government overreach, and I am too. Here in the Cowboy State, we expect privacy. It’s not because we’re trying to hide anything. It’s because this information is, frankly, none of the government’s business.
Wyoming bank customers are not subjects of the federal government, and treating them as such is unconscionable. Banks do not work for the IRS, yet this proposal would increase the size of the IRS and force banks to snoop and snitch on their customers. This is both wrong and shortsighted. Community banks and credit unions, which are important institutions throughout Wyoming, would be forced to betray the trust of their customers in order to do the bidding of the federal government. That’s simply unacceptable.
The IRS is already one of the largest and least accountable bureaucracies in Washington. Time and time again, they’ve shown that they cannot be trusted with our private information. Why would we open ourselves up to more scrutiny by this unaccountable agency? They’ve abused their power in the past, and they have not convinced me that they won’t abuse this power in the future.
I had the opportunity to ask Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen about this proposal. Her answers gave me no confidence that she cares about the concerns of the people in Wyoming. She said it was important that the IRS had more information about people to ensure that no one is gaming the system. The Biden administration believes that people in Wyoming, regular American citizens, are tax cheats. I believe they couldn’t be more wrong.
I won’t stop fighting this proposal. The people of Wyoming deserve better from their government, though sadly this is the kind of overreach we’ve come to expect from the Biden Administration. I encourage you to call and email the White House to make your voice heard (click here to contact). Don’t let up until this proposal is dead in its tracks.