President Donald Trump is suing the Internal Revenue Service to force the American people to pay him at least $10 billion in damages because he was embarrassed when his tax returns leaked out in 2020.

Trump ordered his appointees at federal agencies to speedily give him the billions to settle his lawsuit. But on April 24, federal Judge Kathleen Williams temporarily stopped the greatest shakedown in presidential history.

This tawdry tale took off in late January, when Trump’s lawyers sued the IRS because a contractor sent the president’s tax returns to The New York Times in 2020. That contractor was sentenced to prison for five years, but Trump apparently believes that the American people still owe him a king’s ransom.

Trump is suing an agency he oversees for negligence

The lawsuit asserts that the leaked tax returns caused Trump and his sons “public embarrassment, unfairly tarnished their business reputations, portrayed them in a false light, and negatively affected President Trump, and the other Plaintiffs’ public standing.”

Almost all presidents voluntarily disclose their tax returns. From 2014 onward, Trump often promised to disclose his tax returns if he ran for the presidency, but he never released them.

When the returns finally leaked out just before the 2020 election, many Americans were appalled. In 2016 and 2017, Trump paid only $750 in federal income taxes each year and “paid no income taxes at all in 10 of the previous 15 years.”

However, according to Trump, the real outrage is that other Americans finally learned the president paid far less taxes than they did.

Trump’s lawsuit pretends he was an innocent bystander. Who was president at the time of that leak? Trump. Who appointed the chief of the IRS? Trump. And who deserves $10 billion because of alleged federal misconduct under his watch? Trump.

Trump is pressuring IRS officials to pay him

When asked on NBC News about the link between his IRS lawsuit and his Cabinet members, Trump said: “What I would do, tell them to pay me.”

Trump issued an executive order that “binds all government lawyers to the president’s interpretation of the law,” as The Times reported. And there would be no ethics problem with the self-serving deal, because Attorney General Pam Bondi fired the Justice Department’s chief ethics watchdog before Trump fired her.

Judge Williams set a hearing for May 27 to examine “whether the Constitution allows the president to sue the federal government he oversees,” Politico reported.

The judge noted that the lawsuit claims “President Trump is bring(ing) this suit in his personal capacity,” but that “President Trump’s political title is used in the caption and throughout the Complaint.”

When Trump constantly reminds the court and all parties that he is commander in chief, he cannot also pretend to be a hapless average citizen.

Taxpayers, not IRS, would foot the bill for a settlement

This lawsuit is knee deep in shameless switcheroos. Trump’s legal team proclaimed: “President Trump continues to hold those who wrong America and Americans accountable.” Yet the IRS doesn’t possess vast mines in Botswana that could deliver 150,000 pounds of gold bullion to cover the $10 billion payout. Instead, any settlement will be paid by Americans who paid far more in taxes than Trump.

Trump may envision a public ceremony in which he is presented with a giant check for the $10 billion, akin to the ceremony when he received the Nobel Peace Prize from María Corina Machado, the lady who actually won that award. Hard-pressed taxpayers won’t be amused.

Roughly 100 million Americans pay federal income taxes annually (not counting people who receive more in earned income tax credits than they pay in income taxes). A $10 billion settlement divided by 100 million taxpayers works out to about $100 per taxpayer, or $200 per couple.

If congressional Democrats are savvy, they would mandate that the payout to Trump be financed by IRS penalty letters sent directly to 100 million taxpayers. To add salt to the wound, citizens could be compelled to send their payments directly to his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.

Trump sought to stifle criticism of any IRS settlement he pockets, telling NBC News: “Any money that I win, I’ll give it to charity, 100% to charity, charities that will be approved by government or whatever.”

“Whatever” goes a long way for Trump. How would America benefit from $10 billion going to the Rename Everything Everywhere for Donald Trump Foundation?

His record on contributions to nonprofits is on par with his tax return transparency. The Washington Post reported in 2016: “Trump promised millions to charity. We found less than $10,000 over 7 years.”

In 2019, a New York judge slammed the Donald J. Trump Foundation for flagrantly abusing its nonprofit status to benefit the president’s political efforts.

It makes no sense to hold average Americans liable for a federal agency’s faulty oversight of a contractor. The IRS has a dismal record of protecting taxpayer privacy going back to the last century under both Republican and Democratic presidents.

Fixing the agency is a better solution than letting the president raid the Treasury.

If Trump can command his appointees to give him $10 billion, could he manufacture another grievance against a federal agency and demand $1 trillion? Will shining sunlight on Trump’s commands to his underlings to shower him with tax dollars spur a backlash from long-suffering taxpayers?

Or will Judge Williams’ ruling be a bellwether for other judicial and political rulings that finally block Trump’s claims to practically unlimited power?

James Bovard is the author of “Lost Rights: The Destruction of American Liberty” and 10 other books.