Americans are withholding their federal income tax to protest against Trump
Some US taxpayers are refusing to pay the federal government amid ICE surges, the war with Iran and more
“I’m not paying my federal income taxes this year,” Rachel Cohen declared in a recent Instagram video that received more than 140,000 likes.
The 31-year-old lawyer in Chicago plans to put the $8,800 she owes the federal government in a high-yield savings account instead. She doesn’t want to fund wars in Iran and Gaza or immigration agents detaining her neighbors, she said.
Many commenters said they wanted to do the same. Others worried about her. “I’ve gotten a lot of people saying: ‘Rachel, this is illegal,’” Cohen said. “To which I say, with gentleness: ‘I am a competent attorney!’”
Cohen is part of a new generation of Americans refusing to pay some or all of their federal income taxes. It’s not a new form of dissent – one of the first protests in the United States was, after all, a protest of unfair taxation – but it’s also one that’s gaining steam, as Americans reject how their tax dollars are being spent under Trump.