Trump floats gutting the IRS, moving agents to the border armed with guns
President Donald Trump floated moving nearly 90,000 IRS agents hired under the Biden administration to the border to patrol the area while armed with guns.
"On day one, I immediately halted the hiring of any new IRS agents. They hired, or tried to hire, 88,000 new workers to go after you. And we're in the process of developing a plan to either terminate all of them or maybe we'll move them to the border. And I think we're going to move them to the border," Trump said during a rally at Circa Resort & Casino in Las Vegas on Saturday evening.
"Where they're allowed to carry guns, you know, they're so strong on guns, but these people are allowed to carry guns, so we'll probably move them to the border," he continued. Certain special IRS agents are permitted to carry firearms as part of their duties, according to IRS Code, 26 U.S. Code § 7608.
Trump joined supporters in Las Vegas this weekend after touring destruction in North Carolina left by Hurricane Helene in September, as well as California, where he toured Los Angeles and met with local leaders about the wildfires that have ripped through the area this month.
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While floating moving the thousands of IRS agents to the border, Trump also suggested ending income tax across the board, saying his plans on tariffs could fill the financial gaps.
"How about just no tax," he said to cheers, while he chuckled. "You could do that. You know if the tariffs work out like I think, a thing like that could happen, if you want to know the truth."
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"Years ago, 1870 to 1913, we didn't have an income tax. We had, what we had is tariffs, where foreign countries came in and they stole our jobs, they stole our companies, they stole our product. They ripped us off. And, you know, they used to do numbers. And then we went to tariff, a tariff system. And the tariff system made so much money. It was when we were the richest from 1870 to 1930. Then we came in with the – brilliantly came in – with an income tax," he continued, explaining the Great Depression rocked the U.S. shortly after moving away from the tariff system of the 1800s and early 1900s.
Democrats in 2022 approved $80 billion in funding for the IRS, including to hire roughly 87,000 new agents across a 10-year period as part of the Inflation Reduction Act. President Joe Biden signed the legislation into law that year.
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Trump's Vegas speech focused on taxes, hearkening back to his June campaign rally in the state when he first announced he would eliminate taxes on tips.
"Any worker who relies on tips [as] income, your tips will be 100% yours," Trump said on Saturday in the city that is run by service workers at flashy hotels and casinos and restaurants.
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Trump also touted that a handful of his campaign promises are already unfolding into real results, including withdrawing from the World Health Organization (WHO) and dismantling some federal diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) practices.
"We got rid of the woke crap," Trump said Saturday. "A lot of crap… you know, these people were petrified of it. I'll tell you, these companies, they run these big companies, they were petrified of it."
Fox News Digital's Andrea Margolis contributed to this report.