Will your refund be late? This is how DOGE’s plans of cutting jobs at the IRS can affect your 2025 taxes

As the 2025 Tax Season gets underway, Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has announced its latest target: the Internal Revenue Service. With DOGE looking to reduce the size and scope of the federal workforce, the agency could lose thousands of workers, potentially creating delays in the distribution of tax refunds.

Though the White House justifies these layoffs in the name of efficiency, Democratic leaders see them as anything but.

Upon taking office, DOGE, with the support of the White House, offered buyouts to thousands of federal employees, including some at the IRS. Fed Manager reported that around 4,500 took the deal. Under the Biden administration, an effort was made to increase the size of the IRS workforce to go after wealthy tax avoiders, with a plan to hire 80,000 additional agents by 2031. Reuters reported that around 16,000 workers were hired, boosting the number of total staff to around 100,000. However, since many of those workers are in their first or second year on the job, what is known as their probationary period, they are a likely target for firing. These workers are not expected to be able to take the buyout that might have been offered, and ABC News reported that as many as 15,000 IRS workers could be fired as soon as this week.

The impact these cuts could have on IRS employees and taxpayers

An NPR affiliate out of Kansas City, KCUR, reported that more than 1,000 IRS employees working out of the Midwestern office could be fired this week.

Shannon Ellis, who spoke with the reporter, serves as the president of the National Treasury Employee Union chapter in Kansas City. She explained that the Kansas City office had “been short-staffed for years” and has been open seven days a week to assist taxpayers and avoid the accumulation of a massive backlog. For those who might have their refund processed in Kansas City, the firings could create delays, according to Ellis, who noted that around 812 of the 1000 employees who could be laid off work specifically on reviewing returns and distributing refunds.

Ellis made clear that staff most at risk were those in their first or second year on the job, representing some of her most “economically vulnerable” members. The union leader also explained that those in their probationary period are being fired en mass because they have “less ground to sue the government.”

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