The Trump administration asked the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to revoke Harvard University’s tax-exempt status on Wednesday, a day after President Trump suggested the idea.
Andrew De Mello, the IRS’s acting chief counsel, received an inquiry from the Treasury Department on Wednesday requesting that the agency rescind the Ivy League school’s tax-exemption status, according to The Washington Post.
“Perhaps Harvard should lose its Tax Exempt Status and be Taxed as a Political Entity if it keeps pushing political, ideological, and terrorist inspired/supporting ‘Sickness?’” Trump wrote in a Tuesday Truth Social post. “Remember, Tax Exempt Status is totally contingent on acting in the PUBLIC INTEREST!”
Tax exemption is reserved for nonprofits, social welfare organizations, religious groups and some educational institutions that fit the government’s criteria. However, they are banned from political campaign activity.
Only the IRS can review and revoke the existing status of taxpaying entities and has traditionally done so without presidential interference, as mandated by tax laws.
The development is the latest in the school’s public fallout with the Republican administration for refusing to comply with a list of their demands to maintain federal funds.
“The IRS is supposed to administer the tax rules impartially, not pursue political vendettas against exempt organizations,” Steve Rosenthal, who served as senior fellow at the Tax Policy Center, a Washington-based think tank, told the Post.
On Tuesday, Trump selected Gary Shapley, an IRS employee who testified during investigations regarding Hunter Biden’s taxes, to serve as acting commissioner of the IRS amid other staff shuffling. Last month, the agency announced its third staffing reduction after firing nearly 7,000 trial employees, more than 5,000 of whom were focused on tax compliance, in February.
The Hill reached out to the Treasury Department, White House and IRS for comment.
