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Sens. Cramer, Hagerty, Colleagues Introduce Legislation to Reverse IRS Snooping of Third-Party Payment Platforms

Source: United States Senator Kevin Cramer (R-ND)

WASHINGTON – U.S. Senators Kevin Cramer (R-ND) and Bill Hagerty (R-TN), both members of the Senate Banking Committee, introduced the Stop the Nosy Obsession with Online Payments (SNOOP) Act, a bill to strike the tax code provision inserted by the Biden Administration in the American Rescue Plan (ARP) that requires third-party payment platforms to report businesses’ gross transaction volumes totaling more than $600 to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

“Attempts by Democrats to give the federal government more power and reach into Americans’ day-to-day activities are deeply troubling,” said Senator Cramer. “The federal government should not be able to snoop on taxpayers’ personal transactions. Our bill will undo their plans to spy on Americans’ personal finances and violate their privacy.”

“The Biden Administration is relentless in their attempt to invade the privacy of Americans’ lives and finances,” said Senator Hagerty. “It is regrettable that this Administration insists on advancing their perilous and oppressive political agenda to the detriment of taxpayers’ privacy, heedless of their failed track record of protecting Americans’ confidential data. It is past time we stand up for our small business owners and say ‘no more snooping’ to this Administration’s egregious and unwarranted overreach.”

Prior to the ARP, payment providers were only required to report information when a payee had over 200 commercial transactions per year that exceeded $20,000. As a result of the new provision, thousands of small businesses will have to fill out 1099-Ks to provide their personal information to the IRS, despite the IRS’ poor history of safeguarding Americans’ personal data.

Last year, Senators Cramer and Hagerty and their colleagues introduced theProhibiting IRS Financial Surveillance Act, a bill to prevent the IRS from implementing Democrats’ plan to give the agency access to transaction information of virtually every American. Senator Cramer also helped introduce the Tax Gap Reform and Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Enforcement Act, bicameral legislation to protect taxpayers against Democrats’ campaign to monitor Americans’ bank accounts, place taxpayer finances in a surveillance dragnet, and provide additional mandatory funding to increase the number of ISR agents.
The senator also joined colleagues and every Republican member of the Senate Banking Committee in urging Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) to abandon the Biden Administration’s unprecedented proposal to expand the reporting of the private, confidential financial data of law-abiding Americans from financial institutions to the IRS. He delivered remarks on it here. 

Background:

  • Earlier this month, the Washington Examiner reported that third-party payment processors, like Venmo and PayPal, will be required to report these business transactions. 
  • Over the past year, Democrats have used the IRS to target conservative political organizations and wealthy Americans to further their political agenda. 
  • Although the effort ultimately failed, the Biden Administration attempted to force banks to report data on all bank accounts with more than $600 in annual transactions, which would have allowed them to pry even further into Americans’ lives.