A federal judge on Monday denied an injunction request to prevent the Department of Homeland Security and Internal Revenue Service from partnering to permit U.S. Customs and Immigration Enforcement (ICE) to access taxpayer information to locate illegal immigrants subject to deportation.
The order by U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich came amid a lawsuit by Centro de Trabajadores Unidos, an immigrant-rights aid group, against Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.
“At its core, this case presents a narrow legal issue: Does the Memorandum of Understanding between the IRS and DHS violate the Internal Revenue Code? It does not,” Friedrich wrote in his order.
An earlier memorandum of understanding between DHS and the IRS outlines a process to ensure that sensitive taxpayer data information is protected while allowing law enforcement to pursue criminal violations, a senior Treasury Department official said at the time the deal was reached in April.
The Treasury Department is committed to protecting the privacy of law-abiding taxpayers, but a criminal exception obligates the agency to assist law enforcement, the official told Fox News Digital at the time.
The deal would allow ICE to submit the names and addresses of illegal immigrants to the IRS, who could then cross-check those immigrants’ tax records and provide the immigration agency with current address information.
“The Court agrees that requesting and receiving information for civil enforcement purposes would constitute a cognizable injury, but none of the organizations have established that such an injury is imminent,” Monday’s order states. “As the plaintiffs acknowledge, the Memorandum only allows sharing information for criminal investigations.”
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As the Memorandum provides, its purpose is to establish procedures enabling “requests for addresses of persons subject to criminal investigation,” the order said.
The agreement comes as President Donald Trump has continued to ramp up the deportation effort he promised on the campaign trail.