After more than three decades of service with IRS Criminal Investigation (CI), CI Chief Guy Ficco is leaving the agency. His last day is today.

Changes At The Department

Ficco became Chief in April of 2024, and within a year the second Trump Administration had begun to make major changes at CI and the IRS. Hiring freezes were put in place, including at CI. By June 2025, 250 CI employees had been reassigned to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Three months later, that number had grown to 1,700 assigned to ICE's Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO).

To appreciate just how big a diversion of manpower that was, it helps to know there were only about 3,000 CI employees as of the end of fiscal 2025 on September 30, and about 2,200 of those were agents.

Now, Ficco says CI is pulling back agents from immigration activities and getting them back to CI’s core mission: following the money in tax and other fraud cases.

Leading the department through that time period was, he says, a challenge. But “I’m proud of that,” he explains, and “I’m proud that CI is in a position to move forward.”

CI has also made “some tremendous steps” in utilizing technology and leveraging artificial intelligence in its activities, which Ficco counts as a positive. That’s been a significant development, considering the loss of personnel and, he notes, changes at the Department of Justice. The DOJ’s Tax Division is now not a division, it's just a section in a division. That, combined with some mixed messaging from the DOJ, has raised concerns from some about the effectiveness of CI in the future. Ficco, however, remains focused on the agency’s core mission: tax crimes. “I really believe criminal tax is vital to enforcement in driving voluntary compliance,” Ficco explains.

Ficco was the 26th Chief to hold the post since Elmer Lincoln Irey was given the nod in 1919. Ficco took over from Chief Jim Lee, who announced his retirement from federal service in February 2024. Ficco will be succeeded by Jarod Koopman.

Ficco believes that........

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