IRS Announces Trump Account Transfer Tax Safe Harbor

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has released Revenue Procedure 2026-25, providing guidance on the applicability of gift, estate, or generation-skipping transfer tax liability for individuals making contributions to Trump accounts. The Department of the Treasury and the IRS have received comments and questions about the transfer tax consequences for individual donors who make contributions to Trump accounts, including whether such contributions constitute taxable gifts that must be reported on a gift tax return. Such reporting would be required if contributions to Trump accounts are treated as gifts of future interests.

The Revenue Procedure notes that if all five safe harbor requirements are met for a calendar year in which a taxpayer makes contribution(s) to a Trump account, taxpayers will not be required to file a gift tax return reporting such contributions.

1. Taxpayer is an individual

2. Contribution is in cash

3. Total gifts to individual account beneficiaries do not exceed the annual exclusion amount under IRC Sec. 2503(b) ($19,000 for 2026)

4. Contributions to Trump accounts during the calendar year do not generate a gift or GST tax liability, after application of the taxpayer’s remaining applicable credit amount against the gift tax, or remaining GST exemption

5. Disregarding the Trump account contributions described, no gift tax return is required to be filed, and no gift tax return is otherwise filed, for that calendar year by or on behalf of the taxpayer, whether for GST tax, portability, or other purposes.