"We SHALL NOT be Moved!!!!!!!!"
Statement by Chairman X, Securious N' Ex Commission, 1998, 1999, 200?
Message 11894052
"What Me Worry????? It Can't Happen Here!!!!!!"
Alfred E. Neuman, Idiot, 1999
dailynews.yahoo.com
WASHINGTON (AP) - From the Republican chairman of the House's tax-writing committee to the Democratic White House, politicians have prompted hundreds of audits of political opponents in the 1990s by forwarding complaints about tax-exempt groups to the IRS.
Information triggering the audits range from the referral of a newspaper article or a citizen letter to personal requests for investigations, according to hundreds of documents reviewed by The Associated Press.
Asked about the demands, IRS officials say that tax agents would lose their jobs if they ever let their political views influence audit decisions - regardless of the requester's motivation.
The chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, Rep. Bill Archer, R-Texas, bluntly wrote the tax agency, ''It is my assumption that the Internal Revenue Service has commenced, or will soon commence, an investigation'' of a Buddhist temple in California, where a 1996 fund-raising event was staged for Vice President Al Gore. Archer wrote the letter on Oct. 18, 1996, three weeks before the presidential election.
A lawyer familiar with the temple event, and its aftermath, said the IRS sent criminal investigators to the Hsi Lai Temple, which eventually was named an unindicted co-conspirator in the indictment of a Democratic fund-raising organizer. The lawyer would not be quoted by name.
Former Rep. David Skaggs, D-Colo., said he referred two conservative organizations to the IRS in 1996 to achieve some ''evenhandedness'' after House Republicans began a ''very concerted assault'' on tax-exempt liberal groups.
Skaggs referred the Heritage Foundation and Citizens Against Government Waste to the tax agency based on a newspaper report. It said the groups had sent out a mailing signed by GOP presidential candidate Bob Dole, then shared the list of responders with Dole's campaign.
Within two months of Skaggs' request, both groups found themselves undergoing costly audits that continue today.
''I believed then and I believe now that these were serious possible violations, and the appropriate step was to ask the people with the expertise,'' Skaggs said. ''But it would be incredible to suggest, and I won't, that there was not a political dimension to these things. Of course there is.''
John Von Kannon, vice president and treasurer of the Heritage Foundation, said the audit has cost his organization more than $100,000.
''We are a conservative organization, and there will be some people who don't like us. That's life,'' Von Kannon said. He added his group has done nothing wrong.
The IRS says fewer than 1 percent of the 6,000 to 10,000 audits of tax-exempt groups each year originate with complaints from lawmakers or the White House. The White House forwards about 1,300 constituent letters each year to the IRS, ranging from complaints of wrongdoing to obscure tax questions.
''Citizens often write to the president about issues under the jurisdiction of different federal agencies. We have a choice. We could forward their letters, or we can throw them out. We chose to forward them,'' White House spokesman Jim Kennedy said. He said all letters are referred regardless of political orientation.
Federal law generally prohibits tax-exempt groups from advocating the election or defeat of political candidates.
''We read our mail and deal with the facts appropriately. To ignore the mail is a dereliction of responsibility,'' said Marcus Owens, the IRS official who oversees tax-exempt organizations.
Owens said auditors who make politically motivated decisions ''would lose their jobs and perhaps would wind up with deeper legal problems.''
The White House referred a constituent complaint about the Western Journalism Center, a group that suggested presidential lawyer Vincent Foster did not commit suicide, as investigations found, but was murdered. Conservatives whose investigation Democratic lawmakers sought included the Rev. Jerry Falwell, founder of Liberty University.
The Western Journalism Center estimates its audit cost millions of dollars in lost contributions in addition to actual expenses, according to the group's lawyer, Larry Klayman of Judicial Watch, a conservative legal advocacy organization.
House Administration Committee Chairman Bill Thomas, R-Calif., wrote the IRS on July 26, 1996, to refer a tax-exempt group for possible investigation for ''providing support to a campaign.''
Thomas' letter was long on detail, including documents filed with the Federal Election Commission and fund-raising letters. The congressman asked for a ''prompt reply.''
Critics say the system is ripe for abuse by politicians eager to sic the IRS on enemies. The Landmark Legal Foundation, a conservative legal group that sued the IRS to gain access to requests for audits, found that requests from Congress and the White House go up in election years.
The documents also show IRS officials highlight the origins of complaints.
The IRS computer tracking system in Washington denotes the name of a politician who refers a matter. The original letter from the White House or lawmaker is forwarded to the case agent.
Lawmakers' requests are stamped ''expedite'' to remind IRS officials they must reply in writing within 15 days. A few requests reviewed by AP were marked with notations such as ''hot politically'' or ''sensitive.''
A quarter century ago, President Nixon tried unsuccessfully to force the IRS to ''go after our enemies and not go after our friends.''
Today, the practice is more subtle. Members of Congress or the White House usually attach to their referral a letter from a like-minded constituent or a news article alleging wrongdoing.
In the Western Journalism Center case, presidential aides forwarded a complaint faxed to President Clinton from a supporter in Beverly Hills, Calif., who contended the organization was engaged in a ''vicious media campaign to hurt you.''
The IRS audited the group and upheld its tax-exempt status. Treasury Department investigators reviewed the audit and concluded it was proper.
Not all requests result in audits.
Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., an ally of the president, referred Falwell, an outspoken Clinton critic, for investigation based on a constituent complaint in May 1993 that ''religious broadcasters are using their tax-exempt status for political purposes.''
Waxman urged the agency to keep his constituent's ''concerns in mind.''
The congressman got a speedy reply, but the IRS didn't audit Falwell. Five of his organizations had been audited two years earlier.
IRS officials insist they don't buckle under pressure.
Shown the Archer letter on the Buddhist temple, the IRS' Owens said: ''Archer can use all the language he wants to order, demand, cajole and persuade. But a decision is only made on the facts, and I would expect my commissioner to back me up.'' |
