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President Donald Trump said he's considering firing nearly 90,000 newly hired Internal Revenue Services agents or send them to guard the southern U.S. border days after issuing an indefinite hiring freeze on the federal agency.
“They hired, or tried to hire, 88,000 workers to go after you and we’re in the process of developing a plan to either terminate all of them, or maybe we’ll move them to the border,” Trump said during a rally at Circa Resort & Casino in Las Vegas Saturday (January 25) night. “I think we’re going to move them to the border where they are allowed to carry guns. You know, they’re so strong on guns. But these people are allowed to carry guns. So we will probably move them to the border.”
Trump, 78, included a measure implementing a federal hiring freeze with exceptions for jobs related to national security, public safety and the military among several other executive actions made during his first day in office this past week. The order will enact a 90-day freeze for the federal agencies impact, though the IRS will instead halt all hirings indefinitely until the Trump administration and its newly-established Department of Government Efficiency, determines otherwise.
Trump also declared a national emergency at the U.S.-Mexico border and said he planned to create an external revenue office to collect all foreign-sourced revenue, including tariffs, which he said he promised to raise on foreign countries that didn't comply with his immigration policies during his presidential campaign.