The Trump administration has withheld publication of an annual IRS report that would show how Republicans' 2025 tax cuts affected millions of Americans' taxes, it was revealed on Wednesday.

According to Politico, the delayed release is "unusual," suggesting that it may contain "less-than-flattering" data that the GOP does not want voters to see before the midterms.

The report details which tax breaks were claimed by people in different income brackets, as well as information such as how much they paid in taxes. The IRS typically releases the data in the wake of each filing season, but this year's rollout is more closely anticipated because it is expected to provide the first detailed look at how taxpayers are taking advantage of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, including its new deductions for overtime wages and tipped income.

The data was scheduled to be released in July, then updated again in September as the IRS processed more people's returns — but the agency has published neither. The IRS said it is awaiting approval from the Treasury Department to publish the figures, and no revised release date has been announced — leaving the numbers in limbo with the midterms approaching. The delay has already irked some observers, who complain that it is part of a pattern of the administration withholding otherwise routine releases of tax data.

What is more, notes Politico, the lack of detailed numbers on the 2026 filing season comes as the agency is also under fire for withholding a periodic report on the so-called tax gap, which is the share of taxes owed but not yet paid.

"I think they are hiding stuff that doesn't line up with all the crowing the CEO has been doing," said Nina Olson, a former national taxpayer advocate, referring to Frank Bisignano, the IRS's day-to-day leader, who has joined Republican lawmakers in touting the tax breaks to voters.

While the administration hyped IRS figures earlier in the year, claiming they showed the benefits of the tax cuts, Politico reports that the delayed data is far more granular, showing the uptake of individual provisions in the tax code, as well as details like how much more people in different income groups reported earning and how many people still owed money to the IRS at the time of filing. That granularity is what would make the release the first provision-by-provision picture of how the new law is actually being used — beyond the topline figures the administration has emphasized to date.

These figures have caused problems for the majority party before. Republicans took heat, for example, when figures released in the first year after their 2017 tax cuts showed fewer people taking deductions for charitable contributions.

As Barry Johnson, a former top IRS official, explained to Politico, it is possible that this year's figures include less-than-flattering details about the Republicans' tax cuts — they could show the tax burden shifting between income groups, for instance, or a suspicious number of people claiming specific breaks. He noted that the Treasury is not supposed to be blocking the release of the figures, citing a law President Donald Trump signed in his first term that gave statistical agencies, such as the IRS, more power to decide when to publish data.

"By law, the IRS determines what they release and when it gets released," Johnson said. "Treasury shouldn't have a role in determining the timing of any statistical release. It's unusual."