House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., and Subcommittee Chairman Jim Jordan, R-Ohio., requested the IG look into allegations of political retaliation last June. In response to recent disclosure and apology by IRS, Issa and Jordan issued the following statement:
“The fact that Americans were targeted by the IRS because of their political beliefs is unconscionable. The Committee will aggressively follow up on the IG report and hold responsible officials accountable for this political retaliation.”
On this Sunday’s Meet the Press, Issa said “One of the most offensive parts is…before the IG’s report comes to the public…it’s leaked by the IRS to try to spin the output. This mea culpa’s not an honest one.”
While the IRS issued an apology they denied any political motive or knowing about it early on. Lois Lerner, who heads the IRS unit that oversees tax-exempt groups, said the practice was initiated by low-level workers in Cincinnati. She claimed that she had never discussed the issue with Treasury or White House officials and could not say whether they knew of the problems before her apology Friday.
According to TheHill.com, “a leaked draft report was obtained by the Associated Press Saturday. The AP said the report found that senior IRS officials were aware of the targeting as early as 2011.”
In June 2012, Issa’s committee sent a letter to J. Russell George, Inspector General for Tax Administration, asking about the “detailed questionnaires that many are equating to a campaign of intimidation.
The Committee’s letter acknowledged that the “IRS should provide appropriate scrutiny of organizations applying for tax exempt status,: but noted that “several experts suggest these recent IRS questionnaires exceed appropriate scrutiny. For example Marcus Owens who ran the IRS’s exempt organizations department for a decade, called the IRS initiative an “overreach.”
The Committee advised the Inspector that even though “the IRS must apply the same criteria for all organizations applying for tax exempt status, News reports however indicate that the IRS effort lacks a balance with conservative organizations being the target of the IRS’s heightened scrutiny.”
The Committee letter’s cited an investigation by Roll Call in which several liberal groups reported that none had received the recently sent questionnaire:
“[A] spokesman for Protect Your Care, a 501(c)(4) set up to defend the new healthcare law, said the group has not received any kind of questionnaire from the IRS. Another liberal (501)(c)(4) granted tax-exempt status in May received only a modest six-part questionnaire.