Bush v. United States

Opinion for the court filed by Circuit Judge DYK.

These two tax refund suits claim that the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”) failed to issue deficiency notices as required by law, thus rendering the tax assessments made against the plaintiff-taxpayers invalid. The Court of Federal Claims dismissed taxpayers’ claims, holding that no notice of deficiency was required. While we agree with the taxpayers that deficiency notices were required, we conclude that the taxpayers have failed to establish that the failure to send the required notices was harmful error. We therefore affirm.

BACKGROUND

I

This…