It’s not just the Social Security Administration: IRS pushes partisan pre-election message

Over the past year and a half, Social Security Administration Commissioner Frank Bisignano has sent five separate messages to Social Security recipients with online accounts, each of which pushed an unsubtle political message. The five emails, the most recent of which was sent four days before Election Day 2026, were unsolicited, and each represented a possible misuse of public resources.

But in Donald Trump’s administration, Bisignano wears more than one hat. While leading the Social Security Administration is supposed to be a full-time job, the president also tapped Bisignano to lead the Internal Revenue Service — which, it turns out, also pushed an unsolicited and overtly political pre-election message. The Washington Post reported:

“Hardworking Americans like you are keeping more of what they earn because of President Trump’s historic tax cuts,” IRS Chief Executive Officer Frank J. Bisignano wrote in an email reviewed by The Washington Post and dated Thursday.

The email touted “a new era of tax relief,” saying that millions of eligible Americans took advantage of the Working Families Tax Cuts, including tax breaks for senior citizens and workers who earn overtime pay.

That the tax agency misnamed the Republicans’ domestic policy megabill was emblematic of the larger problem: At Trump’s insistence, the GOP package was officially named the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. Party strategists later decided that wasn’t doing them any favors, so Republicans were told to start referring to the package as the “Working Families Tax Cut Bill” or the “Working Families Tax Plan” as part of a clumsy rebranding campaign.

That the IRS explicitly used the party-approved name instead of the law’s actual name was additional evidence of Bisignano’s partisan agenda.

What’s more, the idea that the Republicans’ package of tax breaks has been some kind of triumph worthy of celebration is absurd. Trump and his party got the policy they wanted, which failed spectacularly to generate jobs, exploded the deficit and created an economy the American mainstream broadly hates.

But even if the IRS’ message was accurate (it most certainly was not, but speaking hypothetically), it’s not the job of the federal government’s tax agency to use official resources to push partisan political messages in the days leading up to an election.

Americans need to be able to rely on ostensibly apolitical federal agencies for accurate information, free of partisan taint. When the public sees Trump ranting online or during a media interview, most probably realize it’s best to approach his nonsense with skepticism.

But when people get unsolicited official statements from the IRS, they should be able to have some confidence that the agency isn’t trying to lobby them with a political message.

But here we are, watching the tax agency join a growing list of politicized agencies being used as partisan tools in the White House’s political toolbox.

This post updates our related earlier coverage.

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