The Internal Revenue Service‘s crypto brass jumped ship this week, as two top digital asset executives bailed on their posts amid a massive staff purge dubbed “DOGE.” Seth Wilks and Raj Mukherjee, who joined the IRS just last year to spearhead cryptocurrency tax initiatives, resigned simultaneously on May 2, accepting the Trump administration’s Deferred Resignation Plan.
The pair’s hasty departure leaves a gaping hole in the agency’s crypto leadership, just as the IRS gears up for its most ambitious digital asset reporting overhaul yet. Talk about terrible timing. They’ll collect paychecks until September while lounging on “administrative leave” – nice work if you can get it.
These weren’t just any bureaucrats. Wilks and Mukherjee came straight from the crypto industry to help the IRS get its act together on digital assets. Their previous crypto industry experience made them uniquely qualified to bridge the gap between digital currencies and tax policy. They masterminded the new 1099-DA form, set to become mandatory in 2025. Now nobody’s home to shepherd that rollout.
They’re not alone in their exodus. Over 20,000 IRS employees grabbed the DOGE lifeline before expected layoffs hit. The mass departure has tax professionals sweating bullets about who’ll actually implement all these new crypto reporting requirements. Market sentiment remains unstable as the Fear and Greed Index shows increasing uncertainty among investors. Nobody likes uncertainty, especially when it comes to taxes.
The timing couldn’t be worse for the crypto community. With new reporting standards looming and regulatory scrutiny intensifying, the industry needed steady hands at the wheel. Instead, they got a leadership vacuum. The IRS claims these departures won’t change their stance on crypto regulation, but good luck enforcing complex rules without experienced chiefs calling the shots.
This reshuffling appears politically motivated, part of a broader government downsizing push. Data privacy concerns are bubbling up, and the crypto market’s getting jittery.
With the mandatory 1099-DA deadline approaching and no seasoned pros to guide implementation, the digital asset space faces a perfect storm of regulatory uncertainty. Sometimes timing really is everything – and in this case, it’s everything wrong.
