IRS targeting controversy
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In 2013, the United States Internal Revenue Service (IRS), under the Obama administration, revealed that it had selected political groups applying for tax-exempt status for intensive scrutiny based on their names or political themes. This led to wide condemnation of the agency and triggered several investigations, including a
Federal Bureau of Investigation The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic intelligence and security service of the United States and its principal federal law enforcement agency. Operating under the jurisdiction of the United States Department of Justice, ...
(FBI) criminal probe ordered by
United States Attorney General The United States attorney general (AG) is the head of the United States Department of Justice, and is the chief law enforcement officer of the federal government of the United States. The attorney general serves as the principal advisor to the p ...
Eric Holder Eric Himpton Holder Jr. (born January 21, 1951) is an American lawyer who served as the 82nd Attorney General of the United States from 2009 to 2015. Holder, serving in the administration of President Barack Obama, was the first African Amer ...
. Conservatives claimed that they were specifically targeted by the IRS, but an exhaustive report released by the Treasury Department's Inspector General in 2017 found that from 2004 to 2013, the IRS used both conservative and liberal keywords to choose targets for further scrutiny. Initial reports described the selections as nearly exclusively of
conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...
groups with terms such as "
Tea Party A tea party is a social gathering event held in the afternoon. For centuries, many societies have cherished drinking tea with a company at noon. Tea parties are considered for formal business meetings, social celebrations or just as an afternoon ...
" in their names. According to Republican lawmakers, liberal-leaning groups and the
Occupy movement The Occupy movement was an international populist socio-political movement that expressed opposition to social and economic inequality and to the perceived lack of "real democracy" around the world. It aimed primarily to advance social and econo ...
had also triggered additional scrutiny, but at a lower rate than conservative groups. The Republican majority on the
House Oversight Committee The Committee on Oversight and Reform is the main investigative committee of the United States House of Representatives. The committee's broad jurisdiction and legislative authority make it one of the most influential and powerful panels in the ...
issued a report, which concluded that although some liberal groups were selected for additional review, the scrutiny that these groups received did not amount to targeting when compared to the greater scrutiny received by conservative groups. The report was criticized by the committee's Democratic minority, which said that the report ignored evidence that the IRS used keywords to identify both liberal and conservative groups. In January 2014,
James Comey James Brien Comey Jr. (; born December 14, 1960) is an American lawyer who was the seventh director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) from 2013 until his dismissal in May 2017. Comey was a registered Republican for most of his adul ...
, who at the time was the
FBI director The Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation is the head of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, a United States' federal law enforcement agency, and is responsible for its day-to-day operations. The FBI Director is appointed for a single ...
, told Fox News that its investigation had found no evidence so far warranting the filing of federal criminal charges in connection with the controversy, as it had not found any evidence of "enemy hunting", and that the investigation continued. On October 23, 2015, the Justice Department declared that no criminal charges would be filed. On September 8, 2017, the Trump Justice Department declined to reopen the criminal investigation into
Lois Lerner Lois Gail Lerner (born October 12, 1950) is an American attorney and former United States federal civil service employee. Lerner became director of the Exempt Organizations Unit of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) in 2005, and subsequently bec ...
, a central figure in the controversy. In October 2017, the Trump Administration agreed to settle a lawsuit filed on behalf of more than four hundred conservative nonprofit groups who claimed that they had been discriminated against by the Internal Revenue Service for an undisclosed amount described by plaintiffs' counsel as "very substantial." The Trump Administration also agreed to settle a second lawsuit brought by forty-one conservative organizations with an apology and an admission from the IRS that subjecting them to "heightened scrutiny and inordinate delays" was wrongful.


Background


Tax exemption and donor anonymity

United States federal tax law, specifically Section 501(c)(4) of the Internal Revenue Code (), exempts certain types of nonprofit organizations from having to pay federal income tax. The statutory language of IRC 501(c)(4) generally requires civic organizations described in that section to be "operated exclusively for the promotion of social welfare".
Treasury regulations Treasury Regulations are the tax regulations issued by the United States Internal Revenue Service (IRS), a bureau of the United States Department of the Treasury. These regulations are the Treasury Department's official interpretations of the Inter ...
interpreting this statutory language apply a more relaxed standard, namely, that the organization "is operated primarily for the purpose of bringing about civic betterments and social improvements". As a result, the
IRS The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is the revenue service for the United States federal government, which is responsible for collecting U.S. federal taxes and administering the Internal Revenue Code, the main body of the federal statutory tax ...
traditionally has permitted organizations described in IRC 501(c)(4) to engage in lobbying and political campaign activities if those activities are not the organization's primary activity. Internal Revenue Service rules also protect groups organized under Section 501(c)(4) as nonprofit organizations dedicated to social welfare from having to reveal the names of their donors or the amount of funds the individual donors have contributed. This protection dates back to the United States Supreme Court's 1958 ruling in '' NAACP v. Alabama'', when the Court held that disclosure of names could render private donors vulnerable to retaliation. Nonprofit organizations dedicated to social welfare are not required to apply for IRS certification in order to operate under Section 501(c)(4) tax exemption rules. However, being certified by the IRS can help organizations attract more donations and provide some protection against further scrutiny. In 2013, examples of 501(c)(4) groups included Organizing for Action, organized to promote President Obama's legislative priorities, and the conservative advocacy organization
Crossroads GPS American Crossroads is a US Super PAC that raises funds from donors to advocate for certain candidates of the Republican Party. It has pioneered many of the new methods of fundraising opened up by the Supreme Court's ruling in ''Citizens United ...
, founded in part by Karl Rove.


Citizens United ruling & Congressional requests for 501(c) investigations

On January 21, 2010, the
U.S. Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point o ...
decided '' Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission'', which overturned many previous restrictions on political campaign spending and allowed nearly unlimited and often anonymous spending by corporations and other groups to influence elections. Some
Tea Party A tea party is a social gathering event held in the afternoon. For centuries, many societies have cherished drinking tea with a company at noon. Tea parties are considered for formal business meetings, social celebrations or just as an afternoon ...
leaders began forming political action committees as offshoots of their 501(c)-tax-exempt organizations. By late September 2010, tax-exempt non-profit groups had spent in excess of $100 million on the mid-term elections, more than double the expenditure from a similar point in the election cycle four years earlier. Public-interest advocacy groups such as
Public Citizen Public Citizen is a non-profit, Progressivism in the United States, progressive consumer rights advocacy group and think tank based in Washington, D.C., United States, with a branch in Austin, Texas, Austin, Texas. Lobbying efforts Public Citizen ...
and
Democracy 21 Democracy 21 is a non-profit organization in the United States that aims to combat the influence of private money in politics by enacting campaign finance reform. It was founded in 1997 by longtime activist Fred Wertheimer Fredric Michael "Fred ...
complained that the IRS and
Federal Election Commission The Federal Election Commission (FEC) is an independent regulatory agency of the United States whose purpose is to enforce campaign finance law in United States federal elections. Created in 1974 through amendments to the Federal Election Cam ...
were failing to provide adequate oversight for 501(c) nonprofit organizations that were pouring money into political campaigns. As ''The New York Times'' reported at the time:
Almost all of the biggest players among third-party groups, in terms of buying television time in House and Senate races since August, have been 501(c) organizations, and their purchases have heavily favored Republicans.... They include 501(c)(4) "social welfare" organizations, like Crossroads, which has been the top spender on Senate races, and Americans for Prosperity, another pro-Republican group that has been the leader on the House side; 501(c)(5) labor unions, which have been supporting Democrats; and 501(c)(6) trade associations, like the United States Chamber of Commerce, which has been spending heavily in support of Republicans.
Shortly thereafter, Senator
Max Baucus Maxwell Sieben Baucus ( Enke; born December 11, 1941) is an American politician who served as a United States senator from Montana from 1978 to 2014. A member of the Democratic Party, he was a U.S. senator for over 35 years, making him the long ...
, Democratic chair of the Senate Finance Committee, referring to ''The New York Times'' and other media reports, asked the IRS to investigate to ensure that nonprofit organizations engaged in political activity were complying with IRS rules and not abusing their tax-exempt status. Republican senators on the finance committee
Orrin Hatch Orrin Grant Hatch (March 22, 1934 – April 23, 2022) was an American attorney and politician who served as a United States senator from Utah from 1977 to 2019. Hatch's 42-year Senate tenure made him the longest-serving Republican U.S. senato ...
and
John Kyl John is a common English name and surname: * John (given name) * John (surname) John may also refer to: New Testament Works * Gospel of John, a title often shortened to John * First Epistle of John, often shortened to 1 John * Second E ...
responded to Baucus' request by writing to the IRS that they were worried this kind of investigation would violate
First Amendment First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1). First or 1st may also refer to: *World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement Arts and media Music * 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and reco ...
rights, and they asked that a Treasury Department inspector general conduct a review of any such investigation to ensure its impartiality. Senate and House Democrats in early 2012 continued to press the IRS to investigate abuses of 501(c)(4) tax-exempt status by organizations engaged in political activity. In a February 2012 letter to then-IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman, several Democratic senators led by Senator
Chuck Schumer Charles Ellis Schumer ( ; born November 23, 1950) is an American politician serving as Senate Majority Leader since January 20, 2021. A member of the Democratic Party, Schumer is in his fourth Senate term, having held his seat since 1999, an ...
wrote, "We urge you to protect legitimate section 501(c)(4) entities by preventing non-conforming organizations that are focused on federal election activities from abusing the tax code." The senators also urged the IRS to issue new rules to prevent this type of abuse. In a follow-up letter sent in March 2012, the senators asked the IRS to clearly define the amount of political activity that is permissible for "social welfare" groups under 501(c)(4) rules, to require the groups to document in their IRS filings the exact percentage of their activity that is dedicated to "social welfare", and to require the groups to notify their donors of what percentage of donations could be claimed for
tax deductions Tax deduction is a reduction of income that is able to be taxed and is commonly a result of expenses, particularly those incurred to produce additional income. Tax deductions are a form of tax incentives, along with exemptions and tax credits. T ...
. The senators promised to introduce legislation to accomplish these aims if the IRS did not do so itself by promptly issuing new administrative rules. None of these letters called for the targeting of groups on the basis of political ideology. Between 2010 and 2012, the number of applications the IRS received each year seeking 501(c)(4) certification doubled. During this period, budget cuts and personnel cuts reduced the IRS's ability to adequately perform its core duties. When the Obama administration requested in 2011 that Congress increase the IRS's $12.1 billion budget by $1 billion to allow the agency to hire 5,100 additional agents, Congress instead reduced the IRS budget to $11.8 billion, and the IRS offered buyouts to 5,400 of its 95,000 employees. The U.S. National Taxpayer Advocate, Nina E. Olson, told ''The New York Times'' in January 2012, "The overriding challenge facing the I.R.S. is that its workload has grown significantly in recent years, while its funding is being cut.... This is causing the I.R.S. to resort to shortcuts that undermine fundamental taxpayer rights and harm taxpayers—and at the same time reduces the I.R.S.'s ability to deliver on its core mission of raising revenue."


Controversial IRS conduct


Controversial intensive scrutiny of political groups

Beginning in March 2010, the IRS more closely scrutinized certain organizations applying for tax-exempt status under sections 501(c)(3) and 501(c)(4) of the Internal Revenue Code by focusing on groups with certain words in their names. In May 2010, some employees of the "Determinations Unit" of the Cincinnati office of the IRS, which is tasked with reviewing applications pertaining to tax-exempt status, began developing a spreadsheet that became known as the "Be On the Look Out" ("BOLO") list. The list, first distributed in August 2010, suggested intensive scrutiny of applicants with names related to a number of political causes, including names related to the Tea Party movement and other conservative causes. Eventually, IRS employees in Ohio, California, and Washington, D.C. applied closer scrutiny to applications from organizations that: * referenced words such as "
Tea Party A tea party is a social gathering event held in the afternoon. For centuries, many societies have cherished drinking tea with a company at noon. Tea parties are considered for formal business meetings, social celebrations or just as an afternoon ...
", "Patriots", or " 9/12 Project", "progressive," "occupy," "Israel," "open source software," "medical marijuana" and "occupied territory advocacy" in the case file; * outlined issues in the application that included government spending, government debt, or taxes; * involved advocating or lobbying to "make America a better place to live"; * had statements in the case file that criticized how the country is being run; * advocated education about the
Constitution A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organisation or other type of entity and commonly determine how that entity is to be governed. When these princ ...
and the
Bill of Rights A bill of rights, sometimes called a declaration of rights or a charter of rights, is a list of the most important rights to the citizens of a country. The purpose is to protect those rights against infringement from public officials and pr ...
; * were focused on challenging the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act—known by many as Obamacare; * questioned the integrity of federal elections. Over the two years between April 2010 and April 2012, the IRS essentially placed on hold the processing of applications for 501(c)(4) tax-exemption status received from organizations with "Tea Party", "patriots", or "9/12" in their names. While apparently none of these organizations' applications were denied during this period, only 4 were approved. During the same general period, the agency approved applications from several dozen presumably
liberal Liberal or liberalism may refer to: Politics * a supporter of liberalism ** Liberalism by country * an adherent of a Liberal Party * Liberalism (international relations) * Sexually liberal feminism * Social liberalism Arts, entertainment and m ...
-leaning organizations whose names included terms such as "progressive", "progress", "liberal", or "equality". However, the IRS also selected several progressive- or Democratic-leaning organizations for increased scrutiny. An affiliate of the liberal group Emerge America had its request for tax-exempt status denied, leading to a review (and the eventual revocation) of the larger Emerge America organization's tax-exempt status. The conservative ''
National Review ''National Review'' is an American conservative editorial magazine, focusing on news and commentary pieces on political, social, and cultural affairs. The magazine was founded by the author William F. Buckley Jr. in 1955. Its editor-in-chief ...
'' states that a November 2010 version of the IRS's BOLO list indicates that liberal and conservative groups were in fact treated differently because liberal groups could be approved for tax-exempt status by line agents, while tea party groups could not. Ryan Chittum of the
Columbia Journalism Review The ''Columbia Journalism Review'' (''CJR'') is a biannual magazine for professional journalists that has been published by the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism since 1961. Its contents include news and media industry trends, an ...
reported in 2011 that a number of non-profit news organizations saw their applications delayed for years after being flagged for additional review. In 2013, Chittum linked that scrutiny to the investigation, reporting that non-profit news organizations and Tea Party groups were placed in the same "Emerging Issues" category by IRS reviewers, which was a category flagged for additional questioning. He stated that "Rather than the Nixonian conspiracy that George Will and The Wall Street Journal editorial page so darkly warned about—with zero evidence—you have a routine bureaucratic procedure meant to bundle potentially problematic applicants together for further review." Media Trackers, a conservative organization, applied to the IRS for recognition of tax-exempt status, and received no response after waiting 16 months. When the organization's founder, Drew Ryun, applied for permanent tax-exempt status for an existing tax-exempt organization with what he said was a "liberal-sounding name" ("Greenhouse Solutions"), that application was approved in three weeks. Ryun has stated he believes that Greenhouse Solutions benefited from its name (although the quick approval might also be due to the fact that Greenhouse Solutions was already operating as a nonprofit and was already on-file with the IRS.) An investigation by ''The New York Times'' reported that several organizations selected for scrutiny by the IRS engaged in activities that could be construed as political. The Ohio Liberty Coalition, whose application was delayed in excess of two years, sent emails to their members regarding Mitt Romney presidential campaign events and handed out Romney "door hangers" while canvassing neighborhoods. Former IRS officials and tax experts say this type of behavior would provide a "legitimate basis" for additional scrutiny. Ohio State University law professor Donald Tobin said: "While some of the I.R.S. questions may have been overbroad, you can look at some of these groups and understand why these questions were being asked."


Examples of questions from the IRS

Some flagged organizations were required to provide further documentation in requests that Rep.
Bill Flores William Hose Flores Sr. (; born February 25, 1954) is an American businessman and politician who was the U.S. representative for from 2011 to 2021. The district, located in the middle of the state, includes Waco, College Station, and Bryan. ...
called "overreaching and impossible to comply with". Documentation requested varied among different groups but, in some cases, included copies of "any contracts" or "training material" the groups may have exchanged with Koch foundations. In one instance, the IRS asked for "summaries or copies of all material passed out at meetings." Several letters asked for "copies of the groups' Web pages, blog posts and social media postings." Organizations were informed that if they did not provide the information sought, they would not be certified as tax-exempt. Another question asked of some unidentified applicants was:
Provide the following information for the income you received and raised for the years from inception to the present. Also, provide the same information for the income you expect to receive and raise for 2012, 2013, and 2014.
a. Donations, contributions, and grant income for each year, which includes the following information: # The names of the donors, contributors, and grantors. If the donor, contributor, or grantor has run or will run for a public office, identify the office. If not, please confirm by answering this question "No". # The amounts of each of the donations, contributions, and grants and the dates you received them. # How did you use these donations, contributions, and grants? Provide the details. If you did not receive or do not expect to receive any donation, contribution, and grant income, please confirm by answering "None received" and/or "None expected".
Another unidentified applicant was asked to "Please provide copies of all your current web pages, including your Blog posts. Please provide copies of all of your newsletters, bulletins, flyers, newsletters or any other media or literature you have disseminated to your members or others. Please provide copies of stories and articles that have been published about you." The Coalition for Life of Iowa, a group opposed to abortion rights, was asked to "Please explain how all of your activities, including the prayer meetings held outside of Planned Parenthood are considered educational as defined under 501(c)(3). Organizations exempt under 501(c)(3) may present opinions with scientific or medical facts. Please explain in detail the activities at these prayer meetings. Also, please provide the percentage of time your group spends on prayer groups as compared with other activities of the organization." While questioning then-Acting Commissioner of the IRS, Steven T. Miller, on May 17, 2013, Congressman
Aaron Schock Aaron Jon Schock (born May 28, 1981) is an American former politician who was Republican U.S. Representative for from 2009 until 2015. The district is based in Peoria and includes part of Springfield. He was the first member of the U.S. Co ...
( R- IL), referring to a report by the conservative, non-profit law firm, the
Thomas More Society The Thomas More Society is a conservative Roman Catholic public-interest law firm based in Chicago. The group has been engaged in many "culture war" issues, promoting its anti-abortion and anti-same-sex marriage beliefs through litigation. Th ...
, misquoted one of the questions asked of the coalition as "please detail the content of the members of your organization's prayers." Schock went on to ask, "Would that be an inappropriate question to a 501(c)(3) applicant? The content of one's prayers?" Miller replied, "It pains me to say I can't speak to that one either." Upon further questioning by Schock, Miller stated that it would "surprise him" if that question were asked. Schock's characterization of the question was included in news reports and was repeated by conservative commentators. However, the Thomas More Society chose to publish the questions that were asked by the IRS. These included a question as to whether the group provided, "education on both sides of the issues," and also a question to "please explain what you are oingduring" 40 Days for Life and Life Chain vigils."


Public disclosure of tax information

In November 2013, the
investigative reporting Investigative journalism is a form of journalism in which reporters deeply investigate a single topic of interest, such as serious crimes, political corruption, or corporate wrongdoing. An investigative journalist may spend months or years res ...
organization
ProPublica ProPublica (), legally Pro Publica, Inc., is a nonprofit organization based in New York City. In 2010, it became the first online news source to win a Pulitzer Prize, for a piece written by one of its journalists''The Guardian'', April 13, 2010P ...
requested information from the IRS on 67 nonprofit groups that had spent money on the 2012 elections, including Karl Rove's
Crossroads GPS American Crossroads is a US Super PAC that raises funds from donors to advocate for certain candidates of the Republican Party. It has pioneered many of the new methods of fundraising opened up by the Supreme Court's ruling in ''Citizens United ...
. The IRS's Cincinnati office responded with the documents from 31 of the groups. Of the 31 groups, nine were confidential applications of conservative groups that had not yet been approved and therefore were not supposed to be publicly disclosed. ProPublica made six of these applications public, "after redacting their financial information, deeming that they were newsworthy." ProPublica had made a records request to the office seeking only completed applications, which are public information.


Gift tax enforcement

In 2011, audit letters were sent to five donors to a now-defunct conservative 501(c)(4) group, Freedom's Watch, which were involved in the 2008 election cycle. The goal of the audit was to assess whether or not gift taxes needed to be paid on these donors' donations to Freedom's Watch. The Congressional Research Service said that the audit was legally well-founded, as tax law exempts only 501(c)(3) and 527 groups from gift taxes. However,
Ari Fleischer Lawrence Ari Fleischer (born October 13, 1960) is an American media consultant and political aide who served as the 23rd White House Press Secretary, for President George W. Bush, from January 2001 to July 2003. As press secretary in the Bush ...
, a board member of the group, alleged that the group was being singled out. According to tax experts, the IRS had not been enforcing that law, but tax lawyers had advised their clients that they might owe the tax, leading to a situation where some paid and some did not. The audit appeared to indicate a new emphasis on enforcing the law, but political opposition from Republicans in Congress led to the IRS dropping the audit and publicly announcing that it would not levy gift taxes on contributions to 501(c)(4) groups. Inspector General J. Russell George's report recommended that the IRS create clearer rules and conduct more training for employees on 501(c)(4) issues, including gift tax exemptions.


Public release of information


Audit report

In early May 2013, the
Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration The Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) is an office in the United States Federal government. It was established in January 1999 in accordance with the Internal Revenue Service Restructuring and Reform Act of 1998 (RRA 98) ...
released an audit report confirming that the IRS used inappropriate criteria to identify potential political cases, including organizations with Tea Party in their names. On May 10, in advance of the public release of the audit findings, Director of the IRS Exempt Organizations division
Lois Lerner Lois Gail Lerner (born October 12, 1950) is an American attorney and former United States federal civil service employee. Lerner became director of the Exempt Organizations Unit of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) in 2005, and subsequently bec ...
answered what was later revealed to be a planted question by stating that the IRS was "apologetic" for what she termed "absolutely inappropriate" actions. (Lerner's superior, then-Acting IRS Commissioner Steven Miller, later testified to Congress that he had discussed with Lerner how she was to make the revelation and apology by answering a pre-arranged question at a meeting of the
American Bar Association The American Bar Association (ABA) is a voluntary bar association of lawyers and law students, which is not specific to any jurisdiction in the United States. Founded in 1878, the ABA's most important stated activities are the setting of aca ...
rather than during an appearance two days earlier before the House Ways & Means Committee in Congress.) She asserted that the extra scrutiny had not been centrally planned and had been done by lower-level "front line people" in the Cincinnati office. Media reports soon revealed that IRS officials in two other regional offices had also been involved in scrutinizing conservative groups and that selected applicants said that they had been told their applications were being overseen by a task force in Washington, D.C. The Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration report showed that Lerner herself had been informed of the affair at a meeting that she had attended on June 29, 2011. On May 12, Republican and Democratic lawmakers called for a full investigation of the Internal Revenue Service, while White House Press Secretary Jay Carney called the IRS's alleged actions "inappropriate". On May 13, ''
The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...
'' reported that Marcus Owens, head of the IRS department examining tax-exempt groups in 1990–1999, said that the IRS routinely categorized similar groups that sought the status of social welfare organizations. At a May 13 press conference, President Obama called the charges "outrageous" if true, and said that anyone found to be responsible for such actions should be held accountable. On May 14, the Inspector General's audit report was made public. President Obama released a statement saying, "The IRS must apply the law in a fair and impartial way, and its employees must act with utmost integrity. This report shows that some of its employees failed that test. I've directed Secretary Lew to hold those responsible for these failures accountable, and to make sure that each of the Inspector General's recommendations are implemented quickly, so that such conduct never happens again. But regardless of how this conduct was allowed to take place, the bottom line is, it was wrong." Attorney General
Eric Holder Eric Himpton Holder Jr. (born January 21, 1951) is an American lawyer who served as the 82nd Attorney General of the United States from 2009 to 2015. Holder, serving in the administration of President Barack Obama, was the first African Amer ...
announced that he had ordered the Justice Department to begin an investigation into whether the activities amounted to criminal behavior.


Findings

The Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration found that inappropriate criteria had been used by IRS personnel to select certain applications for tax exemption status for further review and that inappropriate procedures were applied against organizations based on their names or policy positions. According to the audit, beginning early in 2010, front-line IRS agents violated IRS policy by failing to handle tax matters in an impartial manner that would promote public confidence:
The IRS used inappropriate criteria that identified for review Tea Party and other organizations applying for tax-exempt status based upon their names or policy positions instead of indications of potential political campaign intervention. Ineffective management: 1) allowed inappropriate criteria to be developed and stay in place for more than 18 months, 2) resulted in substantial delays in processing certain applications, and 3) allowed unnecessary information requests to be issued. Although the processing of some applications with potential significant political campaign intervention was started soon after receipt, no work was completed on the majority of these applications for 13 months.... For the 296 total political campaign intervention applications eviewed in the auditas of December 17, 2012, 108 had been approved, 28 were withdrawn by the applicant, none had been denied, and 160 were open from 206 to 1,138 calendar days (some for more than three years and crossing two election cycles).... Many organizations received requests for additional information from the IRS that included unnecessary, burdensome questions (e.g., lists of past and future donors).
The Inspector General concluded, "although the IRS has taken some action, it will need to do more so that the public has reasonable assurance that applications are processed without unreasonable delay in a fair and impartial manner in the future." ''The Washington Post'' described the audit report as having found that some IRS employees were "ignorant about tax laws, defiant of their supervisors and blind to the appearance of impropriety".


Criticism of the inspector general

J. Russell George, the Treasury Department Inspector General who had alerted lawmakers to the IRS's improper behavior, was criticized by Republican lawmakers, who said that because inspectors general are required to notify Congress via agency heads when wrongdoing is discovered—and in serious cases must do so within 7 days—he should have notified Congress in 2012, prior to the election that year. Inspector General George, who was appointed by President George W. Bush, responded by saying that the audit had not been complete, and that in his view, "to ensure fairness and to ensure that we are completely accurate with the information that we convey to Congress, we will not report information until the IRS has had an opportunity to take a look at it to ensure that we're not misstating facts." On June 24, 2013, new IRS commissioner Danny Werfel revealed that an internal investigation had discovered that the inappropriate screening was both broader and longer-lasting than had previously been known. The report found that words such as "Israel", "progressive" and "Occupy" were also used as red-flags for greater scrutiny, and that screeners were still using such lists up until May 2013. A spokesman for the Inspector General's office in charge of the IRS audit said they had been asked by House Oversight Chairman Darrell Issa ( R- CA) "to narrowly focus on Tea Party organizations". On June 27, 2013, responding to letters from Rep.
Sander Levin Sander Martin Levin (born September 6, 1931) is an American politician who served in the United States House of Representatives from 1983 to 2019, representing (numbered as the from 1983 to 1993 and as the from 1993 to 2013). Levin, a member ...
, the ranking member on the Ways and Means Committee, Inspector General J. Russell George's office released a letter to Levin about the scrutiny of groups with "progressive" in their names. Contradicting earlier claims of George's office, the letter acknowledged that he knew that the word "progressive" had appeared in IRS screening documents. However, he said that the "Progressives" criteria were on a part of the "Be On the Look Out" (BOLO) spreadsheet labeled "Historical", and, unlike other BOLO entries, did not say how to refer flagged cases. While he had many sources confirming the use of "Tea Party" and related criteria described in the report, including employee interviews and e-mails, he found no indication in any of those other materials that "Progressives" was a term used to refer cases for scrutiny for political campaign intervention. The letter further stated that out of the 20 groups applying for tax-exempt status whose names contained "progress" or "progressive", 6 had been chosen for more scrutiny as compared to all of the 292 groups applying for tax-exempt status whose names contained "tea party", "patriot", or "9/12".


Second Inspector General's report

In late September 2017, an exhaustive report by the Treasury Department's inspector general found that from 2004 to 2013, the IRS used both conservative and liberal keywords to choose targets for further scrutiny, blunting claims that the issue had been an Obama-era partisan scandal. The 115-page report confirmed the findings of the prior 2013 report that some conservative organizations had been unfairly targeted, but also found that the pattern of misconduct had been ongoing since 2004 and was non-partisan in nature. In reaction, Democratic Senator Ron Wyden of
Oregon Oregon () is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. The Columbia River delineates much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington, while the Snake River delineates much of its eastern boundary with Idaho. T ...
, the ranking Democrat on the
Senate Finance Committee The United States Senate Committee on Finance (or, less formally, Senate Finance Committee) is a standing committee of the United States Senate. The Committee concerns itself with matters relating to taxation and other revenue measures general ...
, stated "After years of baseless claims and false accusations it is my hope Republicans will finally put an end to this witch hunt and admit that their attacks on the I.R.S. were nothing but political grandstanding on behalf of special interests at the expense of American taxpayers." In contrast, the
Republican Republican can refer to: Political ideology * An advocate of a republic, a type of government that is not a monarchy or dictatorship, and is usually associated with the rule of law. ** Republicanism, the ideology in support of republics or agains ...
chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, Kevin Brady of
Texas Texas (, ; Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2020, it is the second-largest U.S. state by ...
, responded by saying that "this report reinforces what government watchdogs and congressional investigators have confirmed time and time again: Bureaucrats at the I.R.S., such as Lois Lerner, arbitrarily and haphazardly administered the tax code and targeted taxpayers based on political ideology." Regardless of reaction, the release of the report brought to an end the last formal governmental investigation into the IRS practice.


Reaction


Initial reaction

Montana's then-senator Max Baucus said the allegations were an "outrageous abuse of power," and West Virginia senator
Joe Manchin Joseph Manchin III (born August 24, 1947) is an American politician and businessman serving as the senior United States senator from West Virginia, a seat he has held since 2010. A member of the Democratic Party, Manchin was the 34th governor o ...
called the IRS's actions "un-American." From May 13 to 15, several senators and congressional representatives called for Acting Commissioner of the IRS, Steven T. Miller, to resign or be fired. The Speaker of the House of Representatives, John Boehner, said, "My question isn't about who's going to resign, my question is who's going to jail over this scandal?... There are laws in place to prevent this type of abuse. Someone made a conscious decision to harass and to hold up these requests for tax-exempt status. I think we need to know who they are and whether they violated the law. Clearly someone violated the law." Later in the day on May 15, 2013, President Obama announced that his Treasury Secretary had requested and accepted Acting Commissioner Miller's resignation. Lawmakers also called for the resignation of Lois Lerner, who ran the IRS's section on tax-exempt organizations, as did Danny Werfel, after he was appointed Acting IRS Commissioner following Miller's resignation. When Lerner refused to resign, she was placed on
administrative leave Administrative leave is a temporary leave from a job assignment, with pay and benefits intact. Generally, the term is reserved for employees of non-business institutions such as schools, police, and hospitals. The definition of administrative leav ...
. Lerner retired effective September 23, 2013. Michael Macleod-Ball, chief of staff at the ACLU's Washington Legislative Office, said, "Even the appearance of playing partisan politics with the tax code is about as constitutionally troubling as it gets. With the recent push to grant federal agencies broad new powers to mandate donor disclosure for advocacy groups on both the left and the right, there must be clear checks in place to prevent this from ever happening again." U.S. Senator
Claire McCaskill Claire Conner McCaskill (; born July 24, 1953) is an American politician who served as a United States Senator from Missouri from 2007 to 2019 and as State Auditor of Missouri from 1999 to 2007. McCaskill is a native of Rolla, Missouri. She g ...
(D- MO) said, "We should not only fire the head of the IRS, which has occurred, but we've got to go down the line and find every single person who had anything to do with this and make sure that they are removed from the IRS and the word goes out that this is unacceptable." There were rallies by members of the
Tea Party A tea party is a social gathering event held in the afternoon. For centuries, many societies have cherished drinking tea with a company at noon. Tea parties are considered for formal business meetings, social celebrations or just as an afternoon ...
in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, as well as across the country protesting selective targeting by the IRS of conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status. U.S. Senator
John Cornyn John Cornyn III ( ; born February 2, 1952) is an American politician and attorney serving as the senior United States senator from Texas, a seat he has held since 2002. A member of the Republican Party, he served as the Senate majority whip for ...
of Texas released a video titled "A Culture of Intimidation" and a website called "IRS targeting Texans" with multiple stories from conservatives in Texas and elsewhere who had received intrusive questions from the IRS. Press reaction to the IRS's actions was intense. * MSNBC's Rachel Maddow said: "There is a reasonable fear by all of us, by any of us, that the kind of power the IRS has could be misused," she further said that this scrutiny of Tea Party groups was "not fair." * Comedy Central's Jon Stewart stated that the controversy had taken "the last arrow in your pro-governance quiver," he further said that this threw doubt on President Obama's "managerial competence" and had proven correct "conspiracy theorists," moving the burden of proof onto federal authorities. * ABC News' Terry Moran wrote that this was: "A truly Nixonian abuse of power by the Obama administration." * NBC's Tom Brokaw stated: "It's time for action." * NBC's White House correspondent Chuck Todd: "It didn't seem like they had a sense of urgency about it, a real sense of outrage," and further; "This is outrageous no matter what political party you are." * MSNBC's Joe Scarborough said: "This is tyranny," and talked of "unspeakable" abuses by the IRS. "This time it's real." A poll released by
Quinnipiac University Quinnipiac University () is a private university in Hamden, Connecticut. The university grants undergraduate, graduate, and professional degrees through its College of Arts and Sciences, School of Business, School of Engineering, School of C ...
on May 30 revealed that 76% of registered voters—including 63% of Democrats—favored the appointment of a
special prosecutor In the United States, a special counsel (formerly called special prosecutor or independent counsel) is a lawyer appointed to investigate, and potentially prosecute, a particular case of suspected wrongdoing for which a conflict of interest exis ...
to independently investigate the allegations of wrongdoing. Pollster Peter A. Brown said there was "overwhelming bipartisan support" for such an investigation. An NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll conducted May 30 to June 2, 2013, found that 55% of respondents believed that the controversy raises questions about the Obama administration's honesty and integrity. This poll found 33% of respondents blamed Obama directly for the actions underlying the controversy. The poll also found the public's confidence in the IRS to be low, with just 10% of respondents expressing confidence in the agency.


Subsequent reactions

While conservatives and Republican politicians have generally continued to view the IRS's conduct as indicative of politically motivated targeting, many liberal commentators and Democratic politicians quickly came to believe that while the conduct was improper, it was not motivated by politics. Consequently, liberal reactions to the controversy have shifted considerably from the initial condemnation and calls for investigation to descriptions of the controversy as the "Vanishing I.R.S. Scandal," and suggestions that subsequent revelations represent a "nail in the ontroversy'scoffin" and the controversy's "fizzl ng. On June 9, 2013, less than a month after the initial revelation, House Oversight Committee ranking member
Elijah Cummings Elijah Eugene Cummings (January 18, 1951October 17, 2019) was an American politician and civil rights advocate who served in the United States House of Representatives for from 1996 until his death in 2019, when he was succeeded by his predecess ...
( D- MD) stated: "Based upon everything I've seen, the case is solved. And if it were me, I would wrap this case up and move on." Following an investigation by the Senate Finance Committee, ranking member Ron Wyden stated: "You are not going to find a partisan political scandal or proof of life on Pluto."


Resignations

* Steven T. Miller, Acting Commissioner of Internal Revenue and Deputy Commissioner for Services and Enforcement resigned on May 15, 2013 * Joseph H. Grant, commissioner of the Tax Exempt and Government Entities Division, retired on June 3, 2013 * Lois Lerner, the Internal Revenue Service official at the center of the controversy, retired effective September 23, 2013.


Lawsuits

Catherine Engelbrecht, founder of conservative group
True the Vote True the Vote (TTV) is a conservative vote-monitoring organization based in Houston, Texas whose stated objective is stopping voter fraud. The organization supports voter ID laws and trains volunteers to be election monitors and to spot and bri ...
, filed a lawsuit claiming that her organization's tax-exempt status was unfairly delayed for three years, and alleging that she and her family's small manufacturing business were chosen for retaliatory investigations by the IRS,
OSHA OSHA or Osha may refer to: Work * Occupational Safety and Health Administration, a federal agency of the United States that regulates workplace safety and health * Occupational Safety and Health Act (United States) of 1970, a federal law in the Un ...
, the
ATF The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (BATFE), commonly referred to as the ATF, is a domestic law enforcement agency within the United States Department of Justice. Its responsibilities include the investigation and preven ...
, and the
FBI The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic intelligence and security service of the United States and its principal federal law enforcement agency. Operating under the jurisdiction of the United States Department of Justice, t ...
. In 2013,
Chris Van Hollen Christopher Van Hollen Jr. (born January 10, 1959) is an American attorney and politician serving as the junior United States senator from Maryland since 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Van Hollen served as the U.S. representative ...
filed a lawsuit against the IRS to stop the tradition of allowing groups engaged in politics to be registered under 501(c)(4). In October 2013, the
National Organization for Marriage The National Organization for Marriage (NOM) is an American non-profit political organization established to work against the legalization of same-sex marriage in the United States. It was formed in 2007 specifically to pass California Proposi ...
(NOM) filed a federal lawsuit, alleging that the IRS intentionally leaked its 2008 tax return, including donor lists, in violation of federal law. The lawsuit arose from the March 2012 disclosure of NOM's tax return information, including its 2008 IRS Form 990, Schedule B, which contains donor data, to the Human Rights Campaign, an
LGBT rights Rights affecting lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender ( LGBT) people vary greatly by country or jurisdiction—encompassing everything from the legal recognition of same-sex marriage to the death penalty for homosexuality. Notably, ...
advocacy group, and to the media. (The disclosure revealed that Romney had given $10,000 to NOM, an advocacy group which was created in support of California's
Proposition 8 Proposition 8, known informally as Prop 8, was a California ballot proposition and a state constitutional amendment intended to ban same-sex marriage; it passed in the November 2008 California state elections and was later overturned in cou ...
to ban same-sex marriage). Under U.S. federal law, "the IRS is required to provide the public with certain tax information for 501(c)(4) organizations upon request—but personal identifying information of donors must be redacted by the agency." In a June 2014 ruling, Judge James Cacheris of the
U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia The United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia (in case citations, E.D. Va.) is one of two United States district courts serving the Commonwealth of Virginia. It has jurisdiction over the Northern Virginia, Hampton ...
dismissed most of NOM's claims. While the IRS acknowledged that it had improperly made an unredacted copy of NOM's tax information public, NOM provided "no evidence that the information was willfully disclosed or the result of gross negligence." In June 2014, the IRS reached a
settlement Settlement may refer to: *Human settlement, a community where people live *Settlement (structural), the distortion or disruption of parts of a building * Closing (real estate), the final step in executing a real estate transaction *Settlement (fin ...
over NOM's remaining claims of improper disclosure of confidential tax information, in which the IRS agreed to pay $50,000 to NOM. In October 2017, the
Trump Trump most commonly refers to: * Donald Trump (born 1946), 45th president of the United States (2017–2021) * Trump (card games), any playing card given an ad-hoc high rank Trump may also refer to: Businesses and organizations * Donald J. T ...
Justice Department settled two lawsuits filed by conservative groups that said they were targeted in the controversy. One of these lawsuits was filed on behalf of 428 groups, and the other was filed on behalf of 41 groups. The settlement included payments of $3.5 million to these groups, an apology, and an admission of wrongdoing from the IRS.


Investigations


Congressional investigations

At least as early as mid-2011, higher-ranking IRS officials knew that conservative groups were being scrutinized. Selected groups complained to various members of Congress. In response, a congressional committee asked IRS Commissioner Douglas H. Shulman about the allegations in 2012. Shulman told the committee that the agency was not targeting conservative groups. After Shulman denied that the IRS was unfairly targeting conservative groups, the congressional committee ended the 2012 phase of the investigation. Shulman resigned his post in late 2012, before the controversy came to light. Following the Inspector General's report, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform began an investigation into the IRS. Additionally, the
House Committee on Ways and Means The Committee on Ways and Means is the chief tax-writing committee of the United States House of Representatives. The committee has jurisdiction over all taxation, tariffs, and other revenue-raising measures, as well as a number of other program ...
expanded its ongoing 2011 investigation into possible IRS political targeting to include the BOLO ("be on the lookout") keyword targeting allegations. On May 15, 2013, the House Oversight Committee requested that Holly Paz, John Shafer, Gary Muther, Liz Hofacre and Joseph Herraz be interviewed beginning May 20, 2013. On May 22, 2013, in her opening statement to the Oversight Committee, Lois Lerner stated: "I have not broken any laws. I have not violated any IRS rules or regulations. And I have not provided false information to this or any other congressional committee." Lerner then invoked her Fifth Amendment right against
self-incrimination In criminal law, self-incrimination is the act of exposing oneself generally, by making a statement, "to an accusation or charge of crime; to involve oneself or another ersonin a criminal prosecution or the danger thereof". (Self-incrimination ...
and refused to testify. Oversight Committee Chairman
Darrell Issa Darrell Edward Issa ( ; born November 1, 1953) is an American businessman and politician who has served as the U.S. representative for California's 50th congressional district since 2021. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served ...
later asserted that Lerner had waived her Fifth Amendment rights by giving partial testimony and that he intended to call her back into the hearings. Congressman
Trey Gowdy Harold Watson "Trey" Gowdy III (born August 22, 1964) is an American television news personality, former politician, and former federal prosecutor who served as the U.S. representative for from 2011 to 2019. His district included much of the Up ...
agreed with Issa. Gowdy stated: "She [Lois Lerner] just waived her Fifth Amendment right. You don't get to tell your side of the story and then not be subjected to cross examination—that's not the way it works. She waived her right to Fifth Amendment privilege by issuing an opening statement. She ought to stand here and answer our questions." Regent University law professor James Duane (professor), James Duane told ''New York (magazine), New York'' magazine that Gowdy's assertion was "extremely imaginative" but "mistaken" because a person who is involuntarily summoned before a grand jury or a legislative body may selectively invoke the right to silence. Harvard Law School professor Alan Dershowitz took a different view, arguing: "You can't simply make statements about a subject and then plead the Fifth in response to questions about the very same subject," and asserting, "[o]nce you open the door to an area of inquiry, you have waived your Fifth Amendment right." On May 22, 2013, former IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman testified that he had frequently visited the White House during 2010–2011, but he denied having discussed the targeting of conservatives with anyone in the White House. His testimony was criticized by several op-ed, columnists. Some media outlets and lawmakers asserted that Shulman had visited the White House up to 157 times; however, ''The Atlantic'' reported that that represented the number of times Shulman was cleared by the United States Secret Service, Secret Service to visit the White House or the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, not necessarily the number of times Shulman actually arrived; visitor sign-in logs can confirm only 11 visits between 2009 and 2012, though the number is likely higher because the sign-in system does not capture every visitor, particularly at large events. Shulman was regularly scheduled for events like the biweekly health-care deputies meeting that would have had a standing list of people cleared to attend. On June 9, 2013, Rep. Cummings released portions of an interview transcript in which an anonymous IRS manager who described himself as a "conservative Republican" told Congressional investigators that he had initiated the selected reviews without any involvement from the White House and that the extra scrutiny was not politically motivated. In an appearance on CNN's ''State of the Union'', Cummings said, "Based upon everything I've seen, the case is solved. And if it were me, I would wrap this case up and move on." Oversight Committee Chairman Issa responded in a statement, "The testimony excerpts Ranking Member Cummings revealed today did not provide anything enlightening or contradict other witness accounts. The only thing Ranking Member Cummings left clear in his comments today is that if it were up to him the investigation would be closed." On May 7, 2014, on a near party-line vote (with six Democrats joining all Republicans) the House of Representatives voted to hold Lerner in contempt of Congress for refusing to cooperate with the Congressional investigation. House Republicans dismissed Lerner's invocation of the Fifth Amendment as ineffective, with Issa stating: "You don't get to use a public hearing to tell the public and press your side of the story and then invoke the Fifth." Democrats characterized the contempt proceeding as a "witch hunt" geared toward the 2014 midterm elections. On June 13, 2014, the IRS notified Republican congressional investigators that it had lost Lerner's emails from January 2009 to April 2011 because of a mid-2011 computer crash. The emails were under subpoena as part of the congressional investigation. On June 19, the IRS said that the damaged hard drive containing Lerner's missing emails had been disposed of more than two years prior. Some commentators have raised legal issues concerning how the IRS handled these federal records. A National Archives and Records Administration spokesperson said in an email communication that: "The Office of the Chief Records Officer for the U.S. Government has contacted the IRS to explore specifics of the situation." On July 9, 2014, Republicans released an April 13, 2013 email from Lerner in which she cautioned colleagues to "be cautious about what we say in emails," citing congressional inquiries. The email did not specify which congressional inquiries Lerner was concerned about and made no mention of the then-impending TIGTA report. Republicans said that this email suggested that Lerner tried to hide evidence from investigators. On September 5, 2014, the IRS said it lost additional emails of five workers under congressional investigation, blaming computer crashes. These five workers include two people based in Cincinnati who worked on Tea Party cases; according to the IRS the crashes all predate congressional investigations and had occurred between September 2009 and February 2014. On September 5, 2014, the United States Senate Homeland Security Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations released its report on the controversy. The subcommittee's majority report, authored by subcommittee chairman Senator Carl Levin and submitted for the subcommittee's Democrats, concurred with TIGTA's finding that inappropriate screening criteria were used but concluded that there was no intentional wrongdoing or political bias in the use of the criteria. The majority faulted TIGTA for omitting from its report that liberal groups were also selected for additional screening and that previous TIGTA inquiries found no indication of political bias at the IRS. The subcommittee's Republican minority submitted a dissenting report authored by ranking member Senator John McCain which broadly validated the TIGTA report and accused the majority of minimizing bias against conservative groups, noting that most of the groups targeted for additional scrutiny were conservative. On November 22, 2014, a spokesman for the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee's Republican majority stated that TIGTA investigators told Congress that they had recovered up to 30,000 emails to and from Lois Lerner. On December 23, 2014, Chairman Issa's staff released a new report that found that "[t]he IRS's inability to keep politics out of objective decisions about interpretation of the tax code damaged its primary function: an apolitical tax collector that Americans can trust to treat them fairly." The report was criticized by Rep. Cummings as "cherry-picked" to support a political narrative. The report did not link the IRS's conduct to coordination with the White House, though Republicans stressed that the investigation is ongoing and will continue in the next Congress. In January 2015, the United States Senate requested that the White House produce all communications it has had with the IRS since 2010.


Senate Finance Committee final report

On August 5, 2015, the Senate Finance Committee released Senate Report 114-119, ''The Internal Revenue Service's Processing of 501(c)(3) and 501(c)(4) Applications for Tax-Exempt Status Submitted by "Political Advocacy" Organizations From 2010-2013''. The Report runs 7,913 pages, and includes a 142-page "Bipartisan Investigative Report as Submitted by Chairman Hatch and Ranking Member Wyden." The Committee concluded that management at the IRS had been "delinquent in its responsibility to provide effective control, guidance, and direction over the processing of applications for tax-exempt status filed by Tea Party and other political advocacy organizations" and that poor planning by the agency resulted in "predictable failure" in addressing those delinquencies. The Committee found that "IRS managers forfeited the opportunity to shape the IRS's response to the influx of political advocacy applications by simply failing to read reports informing them of the existence of those applications." While the report contained many bipartisan findings, Republican and Democratic committee members offered separate reports differing sharply on the ultimate reason for the IRS's failures. The Republican report (entitled "Additional View of Senator Hatch Prepared by Republican Staff") stated that the IRS had targeted Tea Party groups for "politically motivated reasons," while the Democratic report (entitled "Additional View of Senator Wyden Prepared by Democratic Staff") blamed the agency's failures on "gross mismanagement" that treated groups in the same poor manner regardless of ideology.


FBI investigation

In January 2014, the
Federal Bureau of Investigation The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic intelligence and security service of the United States and its principal federal law enforcement agency. Operating under the jurisdiction of the United States Department of Justice, ...
(FBI) announced that it had found no evidence warranting the filing of federal criminal charges in connection with the affair. The FBI stated it found no evidence of "enemy hunting" of the kind that had been suspected, but that the investigation did reveal the IRS to be a mismanaged bureaucracy enforcing rules that IRS personnel did not fully understand. The officials indicated, however, that the investigation is continuing.


DOJ investigation

In October 2015, the Justice Department notified Congress that there would be no charges against the former IRS official Lois Lerner or against anyone else in the IRS. The investigation found no evidence of illegal activity or the partisan targeting of political groups and found that no IRS official attempted to obstruct justice. The DOJ investigation did find evidence of mismanagement and Lerner's poor judgement in using her IRS account for personal messages but said "...poor management is not a crime." In September 2017, the DOJ declined a request from the U.S. House Committee on Ways and Means to reopen the investigation into Lerner's IRS activities.


Impeachment resolution

Four days after the Justice Department closed its investigation, 19 members of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee led by the Committee's Chairman, Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah, UT), filed a resolution to impeachment#United States, impeach IRS Commissioner John Koskinen. Those sponsoring the impeachment resolution to remove Koskinen from office accused him of failing to prevent the destruction of evidence in allowing the erasure of back-up tapes containing thousands of e-mails written by Lois Lerner, and of making false statements under oath to Congress. In a statement released by the Committee, Chaffetz said Koskinen "failed to comply with a congressionally issued subpoena, documents were destroyed on his watch, and the public was consistently misled. Impeachment is the appropriate tool to restore public confidence in the IRS and to protect the institutional interests of Congress." On October 27, 2015, the IRS stated that the agency did not have an immediate comment on the impeachment resolution. Representative Cummings said in a statement: "This ridiculous resolution will demonstrate nothing but the Republican obsession with diving into investigative rabbit holes that waste tens of millions of taxpayer dollars while having absolutely no positive impact on a single American. Calling this resolution a 'stunt' or a 'joke' would be insulting to stunts and jokes."


Deleted evidence

Responding to a lawsuit filed by Judicial Watch, Thomas Kane, Deputy Assistant Chief Counsel for the IRS, wrote in a sworn declaration that Lerner's Blackberry was "removed or wiped clean of any sensitive or proprietary information and removed as scrap for disposal in June 2012." In a ''USA Today'' opinion column, James S. Robbins wrote, "For a scandal that is frequently derided as 'fake,' it is amazing how often real evidence disappears. The disappearing act is so frequent, it is reasonable to wonder whether it is really a systematic attempt to destroy evidence of abuse of power." An IRS Information technology, IT official told the ''
National Review ''National Review'' is an American conservative editorial magazine, focusing on news and commentary pieces on political, social, and cultural affairs. The magazine was founded by the author William F. Buckley Jr. in 1955. Its editor-in-chief ...
'' that any personal folders containing Lerner's emails were unlikely to have been on the Blackberry as, if they had been, then IT employees "wouldn't have been jumping through all the hoops to recover data from [Lerner's crashed hard] drive" in June 2011.


See also

* Nixon's Enemies List - list from Nixon administration accused of being used to target people with IRS audits * Linchpins of Liberty v. United States - Court case regarding IRS targeting heard in the DC Circuit Court of Appeals


References


Footnotes


Notes


Further reading

* * {{Refend IRS targeting controversy, 2010 in the United States, IRS scandal, 2013 2011 in the United States, IRS scandal, 2013 2012 in the United States, IRS scandal, 2013 2013 in the United States, IRS scandal 2013 scandals, IRS scandal Internal Revenue Service Tea Party movement