{"id":19019,"date":"2011-01-23T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2011-01-23T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/oprahs-dislike-writing-irs-checks\/"},"modified":"2026-07-24T22:01:53","modified_gmt":"2026-07-24T22:01:53","slug":"oprahs-dislike-writing-irs-checks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/oprahs-dislike-writing-irs-checks\/","title":{"rendered":"Oprah’s Dislike of Writing IRS Checks"},"content":{"rendered":"

I'm Darrin Mish. For 32 years I've practiced federal tax litigation \u2014 routine audits, Tax Court cases, and everything in between. If you're facing an IRS issue, here's what you need to know first.<\/p>\n

If there\u2019s one thing that Oprah Winfrey dislikes, it is writing checks to the IRS. \u00a0In fact her accountants bring some tequila for her each time she signs them. \u00a0That was the talk show hostess\u2019 admission to Piers Morgan on the CNN talk show that he took over from Larry King. \u00a0In Morgan\u2019s debut episode last Monday, Winfrey said she only signs checks of at least $100,000 these days. \u00a0And apparently, she still has several hundred of such checks to sign. \u00a0Winfrey told Morgan, \u201cIt would knock your socks off. \u00a0Millions are going out.\u201d<\/div>\n
Earlier this month, Winfrey has also launched her own cable TV network called the Oprah Winfrey Network or OWN.<\/div>\n
Morgan asked if signing those checks was painful, to which Winfrey replied, \u201cThe most pain I feel \u2014 and my accountants will tell you this \u2014 is every time I write a check to the IRS, it\u2019s a ceremony. \u00a0For years they came in with wine. \u00a0Now they come in with tequila. \u00a0It\u2019s a tequila-signing ceremony.\u201d<\/div>\n
Morgan then asked what the most painful check that she had ever written to the IRS was, but Winfrey declined to specify it. \u00a0She did however compliment Morgan on his prowess as an interviewer, \u201cYou\u2019re good. \u00a0You think I\u2019m going to give you the number. \u00a0No, no, no, no, no.\u201d \u00a0Well, you certainly can\u2019t be a world-famous talk show host if you\u2019re not witty.<\/div>\n
But Morgan wasn\u2019t going to stop there. \u00a0He changed his focus to Winfrey\u2019s net worth, noting that according to Forbes she was worth around $2.7 billion and asked if the figure was accurate. \u00a0Winfrey replied that she \u2018doesn\u2019t sit around counting it\u2019. \u00a0But she added, \u201cbecause I already had counted it.\u201d<\/div>\n
Still wanting to get some figures from Winfrey, Morgan asked about her philanthropic projects which include the South African-based Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls, a school for disadvantaged young women. \u00a0Morgan noted that she has given away over $300 million to various charities but Winfrey corrected him saying she knew it was more than that amount.<\/div>\n
Asked if she knew how much she has given away exactly, Winfrey replied, \u201cNo, I really don\u2019t, but I know it\u2019s more than $300 million. \u00a0I have this school and it\u2019s ongoing and I\u2019m responsible for all of these girls and them getting an education, and I pay for every single thing and I think that the charitable work that you do \u2014 and when I\u2019m gone everything that I have is going to go to charity because I don\u2019t have children and I believe that that\u2019s what you should do, that that\u2019s how you should live your life. \u00a0To whom much is given, much should be given back. \u00a0To me, the money, it\u2019s certainly a wonderful thing, but it is in direct proportion to how you\u2019re able to bless yourself and how you bless others with it.\u201d<\/div>\n

Check out more Tax Related News<\/a> stories by clicking that link.<\/p>\n

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I'm Darrin Mish. For 32 years I've practiced federal tax litigation \u2014 routine audits, Tax Court cases, and everything in between. If you're facing an IRS issue, here's what you need to know first. If there\u2019s one thing that Oprah Winfrey dislikes, it is writing checks to the IRS. \u00a0In fact her accountants bring some […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[591],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19019","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-irs-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19019","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19019"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19019\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21898,"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19019\/revisions\/21898"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19019"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19019"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/getirshelp.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19019"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}