I disagree. The failure to get an EIN on time does relieve a taxpayer of its filing obligations, after all. For example, if Joe and Brenda form a LLC on 1/1/2017 and the LLC makes $10 million that year but they do not file for an EIN for the LLC until shortly before filing the Form 1041 for it in 2018, getting the EIN in 2018 will not relieve the LLC of its return filing obligation. Whatever problems the IRS might have in processing that return (which would be of its own making rather than anything imposed by law) it would still need to accept and process that return. The taxpayer is required to file it by law, and the taxpayer (and its owners) cannot escape the taxes due simply by the fact that the EIN was obtained late.
Moreover, where the LLC is a single member LLC that has not elected to be taxed as a corporation, the separate existence of the LLC is ignored for federal income tax purposes and the income, deductions, and credits of the LLC are treated as the income, deductions, and credits of the owner. Thus, the income tax reporting requirement is for the owner, not the LLC, and the fact that the LLC does not have an EIN would not prevent the owner from reporting the income, deductions, and credits of the LLC on the owner’s return.
The issue I see is that there is nothing to report for this LLC in 2017 anyway. The only expense incurred was the filing fee to set up the LLC. That expense is not deductible since expenses incurred prior to a business starting operation cannot be deducted. These start-up expenses are instead amortized starting from when the business begins operation under IRC § 195. While a portion of start up expenses may be deducted rather than amortized at the election of the taxpayer, that deduction is taken in the year the business begins operations. Thus, this expense would not be taken until the year actual business operations were to begin.
So I agree that there is nothing to file for 2017, but not because the EIN was not obtained until 2018. Rather, because there is simply nothing to report for 2017.