[EL] big IRS story

Fri May 10 17:03:21 PDT 2013

Except that we don't know if he IRS is failing to force the law re 501c organizations- we do know that there is a partisan political effort to silence certain voices, though - and we do know now that the IRS was using improper political screening.

It's interesting that Sen Levin declares as fact things we dont know have occurred, and where we do now know that abuses occurred he phrases it as a question of "whether" they occurred.

Brad Smith

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On May 10, 2013, at 7:36 PM, "Stephen Spaulding" <SSpaulding at commoncause.org<mailto:SSpaulding at commoncause.org>> wrote:

Senator Levin delineated the issues appropriately in his statement this evening. An investigation into the IRS's failure to enforce the law re: c4s that are set up for no other reason than shielding donor identity & intervening in political campaigns should include an investigation into how the IRS identifies and screens these entities in the first place.

OHis statement is below.

Stephen Spaulding
Staff Counsel
Common Cause

Levin: IRS enforcement of nonprofit rules requires investigation

Friday, May 10, 2013

WASHINGTON – Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., chairman of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, issued the following statement today after the IRS acknowledged it applied additional scrutiny to certain groups applying for nonprofit status:

“My subcommittee has been investigating the IRS’s failure to enforce the law requiring that tax-exempt 501(c)4s be engaged exclusively in social welfare activities, not partisan politics. Today’s announcement by the IRS raises a second issue: whether the IRS, to the extent it has enforced its rules, has been impartial in doing so. Both issues require investigation.”

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On May 10, 2013, at 7:00 PM, "John Tanner" <john.k.tanner at gmail.com<mailto:john.k.tanner at gmail.com>> wrote:

March of Dimes Campaign?

The name of an organization is a terrible, utterly inapproporiate predicate for triggering an investigation.  A federal investigation should only be opened based on activity

On Fri, May 10, 2013 at 6:54 PM, Smith, Brad <BSmith at law.capital.edu<mailto:BSmith at law.capital.edu>> wrote:
Actually, they were not being targeted if they "had words in their title that suggested the organizations were political in nature-- ie that their major purpose was to engage in political activity." They were targeted if they had *certain* words in their title that suggested the organizations were political in nature-- ie that their major purpose was to engage in political activity.

That's a big difference, since the words selected were not neutral, like say, "Campaign."

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On May 10, 2013, at 6:31 PM, "Trevor Potter" <tpotter at capdale.com<mailto:tpotter at capdale.com>> wrote:

To remind everyone of what we know at this point, applications for 501 c4 social welfare status were being flagged for review by IRS staffers if they had words in their title that suggested the organizations were political in nature-- ie that their major purpose was to engage in political activity and therefore they should be registered as a 527 rather than a c4. That is one of the IRS's jobs-- to determine whether a group qualifies for c4 status, or is too "political" in purpose to do so. Based on recent cases, the IRS has certainly questioned/ challenged the appropriateness of c4 status of groups with both "Democrat" and " Republican" in their name.

Trevor Potter

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On May 10, 2013, at 6:22 PM, "Joe La Rue" <joseph.e.larue at gmail.com<mailto:joseph.e.larue at gmail.com>> wrote:

The anger should be there, regardless. NOBODY should be targeted by the IRS because of his or her political views. It doesn't matter to me whether they are targeting conservatives only, liberals only, or conservatives AND liberals together. And it shouldn't matter to anyone else who claims to love freedom. If the government can target us because of our political views, and can subject us to extra scrutiny and make us jump through extensive hoops because of we have political views, then what have we become?

Joe
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On Fri, May 10, 2013 at 3:16 PM, Byron Tau <btau at politico.com<mailto:btau at politico.com>> wrote:
I think the anger comes from the fact that they were just flagging conservative-linked words. If the list also included "progressive" and "liberal," I don't think the anger would be there.

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On May 10, 2013, at 6:03 PM, "john.k.tanner at gmail.com<mailto:john.k.tanner at gmail.com>" <john.k.tanner at gmail.com<mailto:john.k.tanner at gmail.com>> wrote:

Both are common adjectives for advocacy groups as well as the names of political parties.   ADA, SDS, ....
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Subject: Re: [EL] big IRS story

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