All bonuses...are taxable. Trust me....you can’t get a gov’t bonus without it passing the tax requirements (both state and federal). So a $3,000 check is really $2150 by the end-point. This is why I always preferred getting the administrative days off(you could get forty hours a year instead of the bonus).
I thought as much for many government employees but learning as much as we are about some IRS employees, I thought that they might have written different rules for themselves (kind of like Congress seems to do.......insider trading being returned, anyone!