Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin rebuffed a Democratic invitation Thursday to testify next week on the impact of the government shutdown, offering instead to have senior Treasury officials appear before Congress.
House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal, D-Mass., invited Mnuchin earlier in the day to testify before his panel next Thursday, to discuss the Internal Revenue Service’s shutdown contingency plan to bring back more than half the agency’s workforce, much of it focused on the annual tax filing season.
Mnuchin had been scheduled to travel next week to Davos, Switzerland, for the annual World Economic Forum. But after canceling a congressional delegation trip to Afghanistan led by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, the Trump administration also waved off Mnuchin and the rest of its delegation to the upscale international conference.
Even though Mnuchin will be in the country, though, he declined to testify, saying in a letter to Neal that the committee would be “best served” by questioning Treasury and IRS officials with knowledge of the shutdown plans.
Neal said in a statement to the press that he “strongly believe[s] Secretary Mnuchin himself should appear before our committee and answer members’ questions.”
Early filings begin on Jan. 28, and this season is expected to be particularly hectic due to tax cuts and other changes made by the 2017 tax overhaul law.
The Trump administration said it would move ahead with processing tax refunds, citing an Obama-era argument that doing so would be necessary to preserve government property-tax revenues — which is considered an essential function during a shutdown.
That decision has been challenged in court as unconstitutional by the National Treasury Employees Union, the primary union of the IRS, and as violation of a law meant to enforce Congress’s constitutional power over the purse strings of government.
An early request that a judge halt the administration’s decision was rejected on Tuesday. Another court hearing on the union’s complaint and request for a halt to the order will take place on Jan. 31.
