Enforcement

A group of 25 Democrats in the House wrote to congressional leaders asking them to provide $12.1 billion in funding for the Internal Revenue Service, including $5.2 billion for enforcement, with an eye toward cracking down on high-income tax cheats.

The audit overseer also named a new general counsel.

Michael F. Maloney, the chief accountant at the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Division of Enforcement, is leaving the SEC in February.

The House unanimously approved a bill late Tuesday to discourage the Internal Revenue Service from using civil asset forfeitures to seize money and property from taxpayers.

The IRS audited slightly more than 1 million returns of individuals in Fiscal Year 2016, down almost 16 percent from the prior year’s 1.2 million, according to the latest IRS Data Book.

The Internal Revenue Service is turning up the heat on taxpayers. Some of them, anyway.