[EL] Lerner in her own words - "everyone" "screaming"

[Smith, Brad]

And that is, to me, what the scandal has always been about. It's not that there was some White House order (although that wouldn't overly shock me). It's that the White House and the President publicly and repeatedly sounded the "alarm," and the need to get after these groups. It's that members of Congress repeatedly wrote to the IRS to demand that it take action or inquire  why it hadn't (and we know what such an inquiry means). It is that Democrats held show hearings all over Capitol Hill, wherever any committee could with any remote legitimacy claim some jurisdiction, to excoriate these groups. It is that Democrats publicly and private pressured the SEC and the FCC, as well as the IRS, to take action because the FEC would not and Congress was unable to pass DISCLOSE.

Of course the IRS responds to such posturing, inquiries, and vilification. That is the problem. And it continues, as Sen. Whitehouse held a hearing this spring openly accusing groups of violating the law, with no evidence; as Senator Levin promised to "investigate" these conservative organizations; as Senator Durbin sent out mass letters yesterday demanding to know if various persons and groups had in any way funded ALEC.

There was what reformers would call "an astroturf" campaign, headed up by prominent Democratic officeholders and aides, to drum an aura of crisis about the political participation of their political opponents, and then to demand that the huge federal bureaucracy step in to "do something" about it, in light of the fact that Congress could not muster the votes.

That is the problem, and it is exactly what we've been warning about for years would be one of the many problems with campaign finance regulation.


Bradley A. Smith

Josiah H. Blackmore II/Shirley M. Nault

   Professor of Law

Capital University Law School

303 E. Broad St.

Columbus, OH 43215

614.236.6317

http://law.capital.edu/faculty/bios/bsmith.aspx

________________________________
From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu [law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] on behalf of Trevor Potter [tpotter at capdale.com]
Sent: Wednesday, August 07, 2013 11:04 AM
To: Jason Torchinsky; law-election at department-lists.uci.edu
Subject: Re: [EL] Lerner in her own words - "everyone" "screaming"

Jason

I know you are relying on a Breitbart piece, and it has an obvious point of view. However, even that piece does not say that there was any pressure from the “White House” on the IRS, and Breitbart is fair enough to note that there was a great deal of press coverage and editorials in 2010 about new 501 c4s which appeared to be doing  nothing but huge amounts election activity in 2010. As the article states:

“TIGTA's report<http://www.treasury.gov/tigta/auditreports/2013reports/201310053fr.html> contains a few key redactions which conceal precisely how the scrutiny of Tea Party groups began. Reading between the lines it seems<http://www.breitbart.com/InstaBlog/2013/06/03/What-Initiated-the-IRS-Targeting-of-the-Tea-Party> media attention played a role. Plans by a Tea Party group to create a new 501(c)(4) were featured in stories at the NY Times<http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/06/us/politics/06teaparty.html?ref=politics&_r=1&> and NPR<http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=123859296> just a couple weeks after Obama's statements about Citizens United. These stories apparently caught the attention of the IRS which regularly monitors news stories to be aware of developing issues.”

Thus, the “everyone” wanting the IRS to “do something” in context appears to refer to the quite public and common outrage reported on in the press that essentially political entities were using 501 c 4 status to avoid disclosure of their donors which would be required under election law.

Trevor Potter

From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu [mailto:law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] On Behalf Of Jason Torchinsky
Sent: Wednesday, August 07, 2013 10:47 AM
To: law-election at department-lists.uci.edu
Subject: [EL] Lerner in her own words - "everyone" "screaming"

http://www.breitbart.com/InstaBlog/2013/08/06/Lois-Lerner-Discusses-Political-Pressure-on-the-IRS-in-2010

In case anyone missed this, here’s Lois Lerner in her own words from 2010 explaining that “everyone” wanted the IRS to “do something.”

This video according to the report was taken in the fall of 2010.

Implications of this?  I thought the IRS and the White House have maintained there was no pressure on the IRS.


-          Jason Torchinsky

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