The Treasury Department has axed a string of contracts with consulting giant Booz Allen Hamilton over a former employee’s leaks of the tax returns of President Donald Trump — along with Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk — to news outlets.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent ripped the firm’s failure to handle confidential data following the scandal involving former Booz Allen contractor Charles Edward Littlejohn, who stole tax records relating to Trump and handed them to the New York Times.
“Booz Allen failed to implement adequate safeguards to protect sensitive data, including the confidential taxpayer information it had access to through its contracts with the Internal Revenue Service,” Bessent said.
He added that Treasury’s cancellation of the 31 contracts worth $4.8 million annually and $21 million in total obligation was part of Trump’s efforts to “root out waste, fraud, and abuse.”
Littlejohn pleaded guilty in October 2023 to one count of unauthorized disclosure of tax return information.
His leaks came between 2018 and 2020, during Trump’s first term. The president had refused to release his taxes publicly before Littlejohn’s breach revealed details.
The 41-year-old St. Louis native was slapped with a five-year federal prison sentence in January 2024, with the IRS claiming that the leak affected about 406,000 taxpayers between 2018 and 2020.
Stock for Booz Allen — one of the biggest security contractors in the US, which once employed whistleblower Edward Snowden — fell more than 10% following Monday’s announcement, closing down 8.11% at $108.29.
The firm has repeatedly distanced itself from Littlejohn’s actions and emphasized that the breach occurred on government systems, not its own.
“We have consistently condemned in the strongest possible terms the actions of Charles Littlejohn, who was active with the company years ago,” Booz Allen said in a Monday statement to The Post.
“Booz Allen has zero tolerance for violations of the law and operates under the highest ethical and professional guidelines.”
The company also said it stores no taxpayer data on its systems and cannot monitor government networks, and added that the company fully cooperated with the investigation to secure Littlejohn’s prosecution.
“We were surprised by [Monday’s] announcement and look forward to discussing this matter with Treasury,” the statement concluded.
While Bessent’s move appeared to hit the company’s stock, Booz Allen still has deals worth billions of dollars with the Department of Defense.
In August, it signed a five-year, $1.58 billion agreement to provide intelligence analysis related to countering weapons of mass destruction.
Booz Allen has faced criticism for past security incidents.
Its most infamous leak came in 2013 when National Security Agency whistleblower Snowden handed over confidential government documents to Julian Assange’s WikiLeaks website while Snowden was working for Booz Allen.
Snowden, who fled the United States for Russia, said he was disillusioned with his work after learning that the US government had conducted extensive internet and phone surveillance of tens of millions of Americans.
He still faces espionage charges including theft of government property, unauthorized communication of national defense information and willful communication of classified communications intelligence.
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