The U.S. Treasury under Secretary Scott Bessent has seen a “dramatic exodus” of officials in President Donald Trump’s second term, according to a new report.
At least four of the seven top Treasury officials departed after disagreements with the White House over “demands to stretch, if not violate, tax law,” NOTUS reported Wednesday.
Seven of 16 Treasury appointees confirmed by the Senate — roughly 44% — have either “quit or been pushed out of their positions” since Trump resumed office, according to the Partnership for Public Service, a nonpartisan watchdog.
The turnover does not account for additional staffing changes in Bessent’s office, where he has had at least three different chiefs of staff since the beginning of the administration.
The disputes within the department have included Treasury “resistance” to a push to use taxpayer data as part of the administration’s immigration crackdown, as well as the president’s push to establish a $1.8 billion fund to compensate allies as part of a deal with the IRS to drop any past or future tax audits of the president and his family.
The “anti-weaponization” fund was later dropped due to resistance from Senate Republicans.
Mark Mazur, who held senior positions at the IRS under both parties and was acting assistant secretary for tax policy in the Biden Treasury Department, noted that officials are reluctant to comply with questionable directives.
“They’re asking them to do stuff that is well beyond the norm, and for some things that may or may not be legal,” Mazur told NOTUS. “A lot of these people expect to have a career after this administration, and being disbarred would be a bad thing for them.”
The level of turnover among Treasury’s senior ranks is far higher than that under any other treasury secretary this century, indicating that even Republican tax officials have resisted Trump’s demands.
The report added, “By this point in their terms, the Obama and Biden administrations had lost zero Senate-confirmed appointees, according to the Partnership for Public Service. The Bush administration and the first Trump administration had lost two each by this point.”
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