It was outrageous that an employee of an Internal Revenue Service subcontractor revealed Donald Trump’s tax return to the New York Times. And it was entirely proper that the employee, Charles Littlejohn, was prosecuted, convicted and sentenced to five years imprisonment for his conduct. But it didn’t end there.

Not until Thursday, though, had a sitting president filed such a suit. President Trump’s complaint, filed in federal court in Miami against the I.R.S. and the Treasury Department, created what legal experts said was the unparalleled situation of federal agencies facing a lawsuit from the head of the executive branch. Mr. Trump has demanded at least $10 billion in damages.

This is a conundrum. Suing the IRS for the breach of confidentiality, something DOGE might give some thought about, is a recourse available to the victim of the IRS breach. And this time, at least, Trump was indeed the victim.

Mr. Trump’s suit accuses the I.R.S. and the Treasury of not doing enough to prevent the leak of his tax returns by Charles Littlejohn, a former I.R.S. contractor who has admitted to giving Mr. Trump’s tax returns to The New York Times. Mr. Littlejohn was sentenced to five years in prison for leaking Mr. Trump’s returns, as well as tax information about ultrawealthy Americans that Mr. Littlejohn separately provided to ProPublica.

That the suit seeks $10 billion, a rather disproportionately large amount of damages, some might say, would not be particularly concerning since, in the usual course of litigation, the amount would either be negotiated down to a rational amount or, should the case go to trial, whatever the jury decided, the demand notwithstanding.

But this isn’t the usual case because the plaintiff coincidentally happens to be the president, and coincidentally happened to be the person who appointed the Treasury Secretary, the head of the IRS and, boom, the Attorney General. And, coincidentally, selected individuals based primarily on their absolute loyalty to the president who, coincidentally, happens to be the plaintiff.

“It’s an enormous conflict of interest,” said Richard Painter, the chief White House ethics lawyer in the George W. Bush administration. “His own appointees could turn around and say: ‘Let’s give the Trump family a couple of billion. That’s a fair sell.’”

Well, yes. They could. And it would be an enormous conflict of interest, as they were giving away taxpayer money to the person to whom they owe their fealty. Even worse, the decision would be entirely discretionary in the case of a settlement, which would make it hard to argue that it was corrupt since the underlying cause of action for disclosure of confidential IRS records is a legitimate claim.

“It’s not a crazy lawsuit,” said Michael Eric Herz, a professor at Cardozo Law School. “It should be taken seriously and if it was anyone other than the president bringing the lawsuit you would say, ‘I can understand this.’”

That’s not to say that the suit is a slam dunk. It’s not. There is a strong, albeit not conclusive, argument that the IRS was not negligent in its subcontractor’s hiring of Littlejohn.

The first question is whether the I.R.S. could be held liable for the conduct of Mr. Littlejohn, a contractor who worked for Booz Allen and not the I.R.S. The billionaire Ken Griffin previously sued the I.R.S. over Mr. Littlejohn’s leak of his tax returns to ProPublica, and in that case the agency argued that it was not responsible for Mr. Littlejohn’s actions. Mr. Griffin and the I.R.S. settled the case, and the agency apologized for the leak.

There is also an issue with this particular action being time-barred.

Another question is whether Mr. Trump has brought his lawsuit quickly enough. Under federal law, people have two years to sue the government after they discover that their tax returns have been improperly disclosed. While Mr. Littlejohn pleaded guilty in October 2023, Mr. Trump’s complaint said that he did not know that his tax return information had been leaked from the I.R.S. until he received a notice about it from the agency on Jan. 29, 2024 — exactly two years before he filed the suit.

Trump’s claim that he didn’t know about something that was heavily covered by the press and resulting in a criminal prosecution strains credulity. Then again, that’s Trump’s favorite strain.

In the ordinary course of litigation, it would be expected that the government would move to dismiss the action based on the two-year statute of limitations, and there is a high likelihood that the government would prevail. But that means the government wants to fight against Trump, which would mean AG Pam Bondi isn’t invited to anymore sleepovers at the White House.

Of course, if the DoJ chooses not to defend against the case, but give away public monies to Trump without putting up a fight, the optics will look pretty awful but there likely isn’t much that could be done about it, since Trump has a legitimate claim here. And to add insult to injury, there is no requirement that the DoJ disclose the existence of any settlement, or the amount of the settlement, if and when it happens.