President Donald Trump has sought to arm many federal agencies, promoting a broader view of executive power. He and his advisers have argued that the president should directly oversee every part of the executive branch. In doing so, Trump has rejected longstanding regulations that allowed certain agencies—the Department of Justice, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), and the Federal Reserve—a degree of institutional autonomy designed to shield their work from political influence.
The IRS has been one of Trump’s main targets. Last year, Trump wanted the organization to revoke Harvard University’s tax-exempt status, an institution he has publicly fought since the start of his second term. In October 2025, The The Wall Street Journal information that the administration was working to keep loyalists in the IRS’s top criminal investigation unit, and to keep the unit going after its opponents. Recently, Republicans in Congress refused to challenge Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche’s decision to grant Trump and his family immunity from tax audits—an extraordinary expansion of presidential power that would make then-President Richard Nixon blush.
President Donald Trump has sought to arm many federal agencies, promoting a broader view of executive power. He and his advisers have argued that the president should directly oversee every part of the executive branch. In doing so, Trump has rejected longstanding regulations that allowed certain agencies—the Department of Justice, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), and the Federal Reserve—a degree of institutional autonomy designed to shield their work from political influence.
The IRS has been one of Trump’s main targets. Last year, Trump wanted the organization to revoke Harvard University’s tax-exempt status, an institution he has publicly fought since the start of his second term. In October 2025, The The Wall Street Journal information that the administration was working to keep loyalists in the IRS’s top criminal investigation unit, and to keep the unit going after its opponents. Recently, Republicans in Congress refused to challenge Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche’s decision to grant Trump and his family immunity from tax audits—an extraordinary expansion of presidential power that would make then-President Richard Nixon blush.
Whether the politicization of the IRS or other agencies will ultimately succeed and endure remains unclear. So far, Congressional Republicans have shown little interest in challenging these measures, while the Supreme Court has repeatedly backed Trump’s rhetoric about presidential powers. Equally important, the administration has made vigorous efforts to purge the IRS and other agencies of officials who are not fully aligned with MAGA. Historically, these civil servants have been important in blocking presidents who reject the idea that meaningful protections apply to them–or those who decide to do what they want, regardless.
This was true of Nixon, who also tried to assert greater control over the IRS. Nixon’s efforts were an early example of how presidents have tested the limits of executive power and challenged the independence of agencies meant to function beyond political pressure. This episode also shows how courageous people can prevent such an expansion program.
He was elected in 1968 After defeating Democrats Hubert Humphrey and independent George Wallace, Nixon entered the White House with a strong view of presidential power. He was surrounded by senior advisers who shared the vision and urged him to confront civil servants and lawmakers who might try to reduce his authority.
Nixon and his advisers understood from the beginning that maintaining control of the IRS would be necessary to further his goals. As speechwriter Pat Buchanan he wrote“No office in government touches people more than the IRS.” The challenge for Nixon was that the agency had a large degree of autonomy since reforms designed to strengthen its insulation were put in place in the early 1950s. The reforms reflected a broad consensus that the agency in charge of the massive income tax system, which Congress and the Treasury Department had greatly expanded during World War II, needed to make decisions without pressure from the Oval Office. Fear of corruption drove the reforms, too.
During the Watergate investigation, Congress found out in 1970 memory from White House aide Tom Charles Huston to chief of staff HR Haldeman who said: “About 18 months ago, the President expressed a desire for the IRS to challenge left-wing corporations that take advantage of tax shelters. I have been pressuring the IRS ever since to no avail.”
White House counsel John Dean was involved in the operation. Depending to historian Joseph Thorndike, Dean called for an overhaul of the IRS system that would make the agency more “politically responsive” to the president. He had Haldeman’s full support. One of the men’s main goals was to use the IRS’s audit power against individuals on the president’s “enemies list,” including perceived opponents in government, the media, and other institutions that might interfere with his agenda or threaten his authority. The administration had begun compiling this list in 1971, with the goal, according to Dean, being “to use available federal systems to destroy our political enemies.”
Finding an IRS commissioner who was willing to cooperate with the White House’s agenda was critical to the plan.
On June 22, 1971, Nixon fired his first IRS commissioner, Randolph Thrower, an Atlanta lawyer whose efforts to reform the agency and work on a major tax reform bill in 1969 were not enough to win the government’s trust. Even Thrower’s willingness to investigate the continued non-profit tax-exempt status of the new Special Service Staff was not enough to resolve his refusal to hire certain Nixon supporters. Nor will Thrower approve of the political vetting of the president’s opponents. His failure to be a yes man cost him his job.
Nixon made it clear that he wanted Thrower’s successor to be someone who would follow his orders. “I want to make sure he’s a badass puppy, that he’s going to do what he’s told,” he told Haldeman and adviser John Ehrlichman. May 13, “that every income tax return I want to see I see, that it will go after our enemies and not after our friends. Now it’s as simple as that. If not, he doesn’t get a job.”
In the end, however, the White House allowed the process to slip from its strict control. Attorney General John Mitchell pushed for the nomination of Johnnie Walters, the son of South Carolina congressmen and a World War II veteran who had joined the Justice Department in 1969. Walters was no secret liberal. He had earned conservative respect for defending the tax-free status that many of the all-white colleges in the South relied on. Prominent Senator Strom Thurmond convinced Nixon to promote Walters to the post. The New York Times predicted that Walters appealed to Nixon because he “would not be too free in the exercise of his political office.” The Senate confirmed him.
Walters quickly began to understand what the White House expected of him. On September 11, 1972, John Dean handed him an “enemies list,” about 200 names, and explained that the administration wanted every one of them investigated. Walters was taken aback by the request and refused to comply. He later recalled saying, “John, do you realize what you’re doing?”
Walters notified Treasury Secretary George Shultz who advised him to close the list and take no further action. Walters also shared the document with Laurence Woodworth, the distinguished chief of staff of the Congressional Joint Committee on Taxation, to create a transcript showing that he did not act on the White House’s request. Frustrated by Walters’ stubbornness, Nixon told John Dean four days later, “You’ve got to kick Walters first and get a man over there.” He too shown confused with Shultz. “What’s he trying to do, say you can’t play politics with the IRS? There are ways to do that! Goddamn it, come in the middle of the night!”
Although the evidence is not clear about this matter, some authors have claimed that he tried to use the IRS to exert pressure on his opponents in the 1972 election, including. Senator George McGovern and Governor George Wallace. What Nixon’s White House tapes revealed was that on August 3, 1972, in a meeting with Haldeman and Ehrlichman, Nixon. he asked: “Do we look at the financial contributors to the Democratic National Committee? Do we run their income tax returns?” Haldeman’s answer was disappointing: “Not that I know of.” When Nixon asked, “We have all this power and we don’t use it. Now, what is Christ?” Ehrlichman explained, “We’ve got a guy who’s a complete bastard. He’s loyal—he’s fanatically loyal—at the IRS.”
To be sure, Walters did not have a spotless record. He authorized an IRS audit of Lawrence O’Brien, the chairman of the Democratic National Committee who would later become the target of the Watergate raid. But when the investigation turned up any evidence of wrongdoing, Walters refused to continue the abuse. Nor did Walters stop the White House from stepping in and stopping it investigation friends and associates, including Reverend Billy Graham and billionaire Howard Hughes.
In April 1973, Walters resigned. He said Time newspaper: “The foundation of democratic life and the republican form of government is built on the self-assessment tax system.” Now if you leave that, and those people are disappointed, we don’t have democracy.”
Nixon’s tension with the IRS did not end after Walters left. Walters was followed by Donald Alexander, who also stood his ground. The same year that Walters resigned, a scandal emerged about Nixon not paying his fair share of taxes, due to questionable charitable donations involving his own pre-presidential papers. The scandal, which in part led him to say in November 1973, “I’m not corrupt,” led to an example of presidents disclosing their tax information.
Walters was not the only official who stood up to Nixon. Several other senior government officials, such as then-Attorney General Elliot Richardson, also refused to comply with the president’s demands, indicating that pockets of institutional dissent still existed within the administration.
Currently, the balance of power, as it still exists, is at its worst. The deep partisan divide has significantly reduced Republicans’ willingness to oppose the president, with few exceptions (such as their opposition to his proposed DOJ slush fund). Unlike Nixon, the public doesn’t have to wait for a congressional investigation to find out what happened. Much of what Trump does is in broad daylight because he’s confident Republicans will stand by him—and because he feels that if the president takes action publicly, it lessens the possibility of a scandal.
During his second term, Trump has also gone further than Nixon in filling key government positions with supporters who show little interest in protecting the integrity of the institutions they oversee. When the president pushes them to act, they are generally willing to do so. And when officials like former Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell defy him, he responds with threats, threats and investigations. Meanwhile, the president now benefits from a 6-3 conservative Supreme Court that has repeatedly demonstrated its commitment to a strong concept of executive power, including the landmark 2024 ruling that gave presidents complete immunity from criminal prosecution.
Restoring balance to the system and regaining control of the presidency will require many different efforts. Among the most important will be courageous individuals within the executive branch—statists like Walters in the early 1970s—who have the fortitude to say no when asked to take actions that erode principles first established 250 years ago.
