The persecution of anyone suspected of being an undocumented immigrant in the United States is not only taking the form of armed, masked ICE agents. Tax is being weaponised against them too. An estimated 10.9 million undocumented immigrants are the powerhouse of the United States economy, and also an exploitable workforce with minimal rights. It turns out that they're paying a higher effective tax rate than 55 mega-corporations and several billionaires:

There's something very wrong with our tax system, that people with that much wealth could be paying a lower tax rate than undocumented immigrants who are generally working in low paying jobs.

A nation that's focused on persecuting and purging specific groups of people is not a healthy one. And as people are being ripped out of their communities, we look at the data that show how devastating it is for the economy and public services too.

Plus: bullying at home, bullying abroad: President Trump is deploying tariffs and threats of tariffs against countries who have the audacity to want to tax US multinationals fairly on the business they do in their countries. We look at the options for nations to stand together and resist.

The US administration wants US multinationals to be more able to continue to commit corporate tax abuse than everybody else.

Featuring:

Alex Cobham, Tax Justice Network

Lauren Loricchio, investigations editor, Tax Notes

William Rice, policy consultant, Americans for Tax Fairness

Delia Catalina Ramírez, Congresswoman, Illinois, District 3

Co-produced by host Naomi Fowler and Leo Schick.

Transcript (some is automated and may not be 100% accurate) https://podcasts.taxjustice.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/Transcript_July_25.pdf

Further reading:

Information Sharing Deal Complicates Immigrant Return Filing, Lauren Loricchio, Tax Notes https://www.taxnotes.com/featured-news/information-sharing-deal-complicates-immigrant-return-filing/2025/05/28/7sc72

What a 3.5% tax on remittances could do to the developing world, Jesse Chase-Lubitz, Devex https://www.devex.com/news/what-a-3-5-tax-on-remittances-could-do-to-the-developing-world-110206

Undocumented Workers Pay Higher Effective Tax Rate than 55 Mega Corporations and Several Billionaires, Americans for Tax Fairness study https://americansfortaxfairness.org/undocumented-workers-pay-higher-effective-tax-rate-55-mega-corporations-several-billionaires/

Report: Report: How Undocumented Immigrants Contribute to Our Economy & Pay Higher Tax Rates Than Many Major Corporations, Americans for Tax Fairness https://americansfortaxfairness.org/undocumented-immigrants-contribute-economy/

ICE Agents Deserve No Privacy, the Intercept: "Armed gangs of officers, often masked and anonymous" https://theintercept.com/2025/07/01/masked-ice-agents-victimization-accountability/

We’re Now at the Stage Where Criminals Are Impersonating ICE Agents, This is what happens when federal authorities are allowed to seize people without identifying themselves, The New Republic https://newrepublic.com/post/196360/man-impersonates-ice-agent-robs-immigrant-pennsylvania

Tax Payments by Undocumented Immigrants, Institute of Taxation and Economic Policy https://itep.org/undocumented-immigrants-taxes-2024/

Our website with all our podcasts is https://podcasts.taxjustice.net/ where you can also subscribe and get an email every time the Taxcast drops!

The life-changing, life-saving, transformational nature of tax - for people and planet. Ireland's got a tax windfall of about €14 billion - that's roughly $15 billion. What are they going to do with it..?

"This is the kind of moment that doesn't come around often and we really need to seize it. Or if we let the opportunity slip through our fingers, it's going to have impacts for future generations." ~ Mansi Rawat, Social Justice Ireland

We don't do enough about blue sky thinking on how tax can transform our lives. This is our chance to unlock our imaginations. It's also time for Ireland to rethink its tax haven model and for many countries, not just Ireland, to ask who its economy is serving.

The Taxcast is produced by Naomi Fowler and Leo Schick of the Tax Justice Network.

Further reading:

Here's the transcript of the show (some is automated and may not be 100% accurate:

https://podcasts.taxjustice.net/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/Taxcast-May-2025-Transcript.pdf

Pope Francis, 1936-2025 (Tax Justice Network) https://taxjustice.net/2025/04/24/pope-francis-1936-2025/

Top EU court rules Apple owes Ireland over $14B in back taxes https://www.icij.org/investigations/paradise-papers/top-eu-court-rules-apple-owes-ireland-over-14b-in-back-taxes/

EU’s Apple ‘victory’ highlights the failure of international tax rules (Tax Justice Network) https://taxjustice.net/press/eus-apple-victory-highlights-the-failure-of-international-tax-rules/

A response to the European court’s bad Apple ruling, (Alex Cobham, Tax Justice Network) https://taxjustice.net/2020/07/15/a-response-to-the-european-courts-bad-apple-ruling/

Tax Haven Ireland, a book by Brian O'Boyle and Kieran Allen https://www.plutobooks.com/9780745345314/tax-haven-ireland/

Previous Taxcast episode featuring Brian O'Boyle and Kieran Allen talking about their book Tax Haven Ireland. https://podcasts.taxjustice.net/episode/116-tax-haven-ireland/

Budget Analysis by Social Justice Ireland (they have also written about managing the windfall gains) https://www.socialjustice.ie/system/files/file-uploads/2024-10/Budget%202025%20Analysis%20and%20Critique%20%281%29.pdf

People Before Profit calls for Apple taxes to fund State construction firm, RTE https://www.rte.ie/news/politics/2024/1104/1479063-pbp-state-construction/

Our podcast website with all our podcasts: https://podcasts.taxjustice.net/