By Andrew Goudsward
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -A former U.S. Internal Revenue Service contractor was sentenced on Monday to five years in prison for leaking the tax records of Donald Trump and thousands of other wealthy Americans to media organizations, with a judge calling his actions a threat to democracy.
Charles Littlejohn, 38, pleaded guilty in October to a charge of disclosing income tax return information without authorization.
U.S. District Judge Ana Reyes, who handed down the sentence in Washington, linked Littlejohn's actions to broader attacks on elected officials in the United States.
"What you did in targeting the sitting president of the United States was an attack on our constitutional democracy," Reyes told Littlejohn. "It cannot be open season on our elected officials."
Federal prosecutors had sought a five-year sentence, the maximum allowed under U.S. law, arguing that Littlejohn was motivated by a political agenda and compromised the security of sensitive personal information. Prosecutors said Littlejohn sought a position at a consulting firm that works with the IRS in 2017 in hopes of accessing and disclosing records on Trump, who was president at the time.
Trump became the first major U.S. presidential candidate in decades not to release his tax returns when he ran for the White House in 2016. A U.S. House of Representatives panel released six years of his tax records in 2022 after a court battle.
Littlejohn ultimately leaked more than 8,000 income tax returns relating to about 7,600 people. Prosecutor Jonathan Jacobson said Littlejohn improperly sought to "influence" the 2020 election and "reshape our nation's political discourse."
Littlejohn apologized for his actions.
"I acted out of a sincere, if misguided, belief that I was serving the public interest," Littlejohn told the court.
Republican Senator Rick Scott of Florida, whose tax records were part of the leak, spoke out in court against Littlejohn's plea agreement with prosecutors, calling it a "sweetheart deal."
Scott said the victims of Littlejohn's disclosures were "attacked" because they were "wealthy or Republican or both."
Littlejohn's lawyers said he was motivated by a "deep, moral belief" that the public had a right to know the information he shared. Littlejohn's legal team did not request a specific sentence, but sought a punishment comparable to prior government leakers.
Littlejohn secretly downloaded years of Trump's tax records in 2018, later sharing them with reporters from the New York Times, according to court documents. The newspaper published a series of articles in 2020 revealing that Trump paid no income tax in 10 of the 15 years before he was elected president.
He later leaked tax information on "ultra-high net worth taxpayers" to the investigative news outlet ProPublica. Littlejohn was motivated by concerns about economic inequality and wanted to spur reforms to the U.S. tax system, his defense team wrote in court documents.
ProPublica published nearly 50 articles based on the information, revealing how the wealthy evade income taxes in the United States.