This is a partial list of allegations of misuse of the United States Internal Revenue Service (IRS), which traces its roots to the creation of the Commissioner of Internal Revenue in 1862. Examples of political profiling controversies include cases in which IRS employees or government officials have allegedly used IRS resources to target individuals and groups for espousing or expressing particular political beliefs.
Use of the IRS for political targeting has been alleged as far back as the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration. To discredit political opponent Huey Long and damage his support base, Roosevelt had Long's finances investigated by the Internal Revenue Service in 1934. [1]
"My father," Elliott Roosevelt observed of his famous parent, "may have been the originator of the concept of employing the IRS as a weapon of political retribution." [2]
The most famous Kennedy administration project allegedly deploying tax-related targeting was called the "Ideological Organizations Project". This was a project which allegedly investigated, intimidated, and challenged the tax-exempt status of right-wing foundations. [3]
Many instances of alleged political profiling were coordinated with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), sometimes under COINTELPRO. [4] The IRS provided the FBI with free access to tax returns, which the FBI used to investigate groups as ideologically varied as the John Birch Society, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, and the American Communist Party. [5]
Beginning in the 1950s and continuing into the 1960s, the IRS audited civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. numerous times. [6] [7] In addition to King himself, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and several of King's lawyers were subjected to audits.
In 1974, a Bill of Impeachment against President Richard Nixon was approved by the House Judiciary Committee that included charges that his administration attempted to use the IRS in a discriminatory manner:
Conservative groups, including The Heritage Foundation, the National Rifle Association of America, and Judicial Watch alleged that the Clinton administration subjected them to politically motivated audits. [9]
In September 1992, Paula Jones who had filed a civil lawsuit against Bill Clinton alleging sexual harassment was audited by the IRS and alleged it was politically motivated. Clinton press secretary Mike McCurry denied that the white house had any involvement. [10] [11] Juanita Broaddrick who accused Clinton of raping her was also audited by the IRS and told the New York Post “I do not think this was a coincidence”. Broaddrick's lawyer Larry Klayman filed a complaint with the inspector general of the Treasury Department. [12]
In May 1993, Clinton's associate white house counsel William H. Kennedy met with FBI agents at the White House, where he asked them to investigate Billy Dale, who had been fired from the White House travel office. The agents hesitated investigating Dale, saying that there was not sufficient evidence to justify an investigation, but they agreed to investigate after Kennedy told them that he would turn to the Internal Revenue Service for help if they didn't investigate. Republican Party opponents of the Clintons alleged that Kennedy pressured the agents. A White House internal review criticized Kennedy's actions. [13]
The NAACP was audited in 2004 after its chairman criticized then-President George W. Bush for failing to address the group, becoming the first president to do so since Herbert Hoover. [14] The IRS informed the NAACP that the audit was prompted by then-NAACP-chairman Julian Bond's speech, which "condemned the administration policies of George W. Bush on education, the economy and the war in Iraq." [15] Although the IRS maintained that the audit was an attempt to determine whether the NAACP had involved itself in a political campaign, the NAACP and Democratic Party representatives characterized the audit as an attempt to stifle criticism of Bush, intimidate NAACP members, and harm the NAACP's get-out-the-vote campaign. [14] [15]
According to the Huffington Post in 2004, the Wall Street Journal reported that the IRS audited the liberal group Greenpeace at the request of Public Interest Watch, a group funded by Exxon-Mobil. [16] Exxon-Mobil said it was not aware of the IRS audit, nor did it have a role in initiating the audit. [17]
According to the Tampa Bay Times PolitiFact the allegation that the IRS during the Bush Administration targeted liberal groups is "Mostly False". [18]
In May 2013, the IRS admitted it had subjected conservative political groups to closer scrutiny in their applications for tax-exempt status based on particular keywords in their names. The agency has maintained that low-level employees took it upon themselves to do this. [19] [20] However, Republicans argue that the refusal of Lois Lerner (at the time was Director of the IRS's Exempt Organizations Unit) to testify before Congress, twice citing her Constitutional right against self-incrimination, suggests involvement by higher-level employees.[ citation needed ] An internal report by the agency's Inspector General cited "ineffective management" as the cause and indicated that the IRS "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." [21] Congress continues to investigate the possibility that Lerner or other high-level officials were involved in improper political targeting. Republican lawmakers say the IRS has improperly withheld and destroyed evidence, while Democrats argue that Republicans are attempting to keep the controversy alive for political purposes.[ citation needed ]
President Donald Trump may have illegally targeted political enemies James Comey and Andrew McCabe with IRS audits. [22]
William Jefferson Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd president of the United States from 1993 to 2001. A member of the Democratic Party, he previously served as Governor of Arkansas from 1979 to 1981 and again from 1983 to 1992. Clinton, whose policies reflected a centrist "Third Way" political philosophy, became known as a New Democrat.
"Nixon's Enemies List" is the informal name of what started as a list of President of the United States Richard Nixon's major political opponents compiled by Charles Colson, written by George T. Bell, and sent in memorandum form to John Dean on September 9, 1971. The list was part of a campaign officially known as "Opponents List" and "Political Enemies Project".
In politics, opposition research is the practice of collecting information on a political opponent or other adversary that can be used to discredit or otherwise weaken them. The information can include biographical, legal, criminal, medical, educational, or financial history or activities, as well as prior media coverage, or the voting record of a politician. Opposition research can also entail using "trackers" to follow an individual and record their activities or political speeches.
The White House FBI files controversy of the Clinton Administration, often referred to as Filegate, arose in June 1996 around improper access in 1993 and 1994 to FBI security-clearance documents. Craig Livingstone, director of the White House's Office of Personnel Security, improperly requested, and received from the FBI, background reports concerning several hundred individuals without asking permission. The revelations provoked a strong political and press reaction because many of the files covered White House employees from previous Republican administrations, including top presidential advisors. Under criticism, Livingstone resigned from his position. Allegations were made that senior White House figures, including First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton, may have requested and read the files for political purposes, and that the First Lady had authorized the hiring of the underqualified Livingstone.
Judicial Watch (JW) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit American conservative activist group that files Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuits to investigate claimed misconduct by government officials. Founded in 1994, JW has primarily targeted Democrats, in particular the administrations of Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, as well as Hillary Clinton's role in them. It was founded by attorney Larry Klayman, and has been led by Tom Fitton since 2003.
Juanita Broaddrick is an American former nursing home administrator. She alleged that she was raped by U.S. President Bill Clinton on April 25, 1978, when he was the Attorney General of Arkansas. Clinton declined to comment on the issue.
The White House travel office controversy, sometimes referred to as Travelgate, was the first major ethics controversy of the Clinton administration. It began in May 1993, when seven employees of the White House Travel Office were fired. This action was unusual because executive-branch employees typically remain in their posts for many years.
Patrick Francis Kennedy is a former career Foreign Service Officer who served as the U.S. State Department's Under Secretary of State for Management. He was Director of the Office of Management Policy, Rightsizing and Innovation. He has been Deputy Director for Management at the cabinet level Office of the Director of National Intelligence; he returned to the Department of State on May 7, 2007. Kennedy was U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations for Management and Reform and previously served as Chief of Staff for the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq. He was the Assistant Secretary of State for Administration for the Clinton Administration from 1993 to 2001. In 2014, Kennedy was elected as a fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration.
James Brien Comey Jr. is an American lawyer who was the seventh director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) from 2013 until his termination in May 2017. Comey was a registered Republican for most of his adult life; however, in 2016, he described himself as unaffiliated.
In the politics of the United States, an October surprise is a news event that may influence the outcome of an upcoming November election, whether deliberately planned or spontaneously occurring. Because the date for national elections is in early November, events that take place in October have greater potential to influence the decisions of prospective voters and allow less time to take remedial action; thus, relatively last-minute news stories could either change the course of an election or reinforce the inevitable. The term "October surprise" was coined by William Casey when he served as campaign manager of Ronald Reagan's 1980 presidential campaign. However, there were October election-upending events that predated the coining of the term.
Abuse of power or abuse of authority, in the form of "malfeasance in office" or "official abuse of power", is the commission of an unlawful act, done in an official capacity, which affects the performance of official duties. Malfeasance in office is often a just cause for removal of an elected official by statute or recall election. Officials who abuse their power are often corrupt.
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 law. It is an agency of the Department of the Treasury and led by the Commissioner of Internal Revenue, who is appointed to a five-year term by the President of the United States. The duties of the IRS include providing tax assistance to taxpayers; pursuing and resolving instances of erroneous or fraudulent tax filings; and overseeing various benefits programs, including the Affordable Care Act.
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 (FBI) criminal probe ordered by United States Attorney General Eric Holder. 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.
Lois Gail Lerner 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 became the central figure in the 2013 IRS targeting controversy in the targeting of politically aligned groups, either denying them tax-exempt status outright or delaying that status until they could no longer take effective part in the 2012 election. On May 10, 2013, in a conference call with reporters, Lerner apologized that Tea Party groups and other groups had been targeted for audits of their applications for tax-exemption. Both conservative and liberal groups were scrutinized. Only three groups—all branches of the Democratic group Emerge America—had tax exemptions revoked. Lerner resigned over the controversy. An investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation, completed in 2015, found "substantial evidence of mismanagement, poor judgment and institutional inertia" but "found no evidence that any IRS official acted based on political, discriminatory, corrupt, or other inappropriate motives that would support a criminal prosecution".
The bill H.Res. 565, official title "Calling on Attorney General Eric H. Holder, Jr., to appoint a special counsel to investigate the targeting of conservative nonprofit groups by the Internal Revenue Service," was passed by the United States House of Representatives during the 113th United States Congress. The simple resolution asks U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to appoint a special counsel to investigate that 2013 IRS scandal. The Internal Revenue Service revealed in 2013 that it had selected political groups applying for tax-exempt status for closer scrutiny based on their names or political themes.
H.Res. 574, officially titled Recommending that the House of Representatives find Lois G. Lerner, Former Director, Exempt Organizations, Internal Revenue Service, in contempt of Congress for refusal to comply with a subpoena duly issued by the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, was a simple resolution that passed in the United States House of Representatives during the 113th United States Congress. The resolution was in response to the testimony of Lois Lerner, a former Internal Revenue Service (IRS) employee, who was at the center of the then-ongoing 2013 IRS controversy over the agency's targeting of selected political groups applying for tax-exempt status. The resolution held Lerner in contempt of Congress for refusing to testify at a congressional hearing.
William H. Kennedy III is an American lawyer from Arkansas, who served as Associate White House Counsel during the Clinton administration.
The tax status of the Church of Scientology in the United States has been the subject of decades of controversy and litigation. Although the Church of Scientology was initially partially exempted by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) from paying federal income tax, its two principal entities in the United States lost this exemption in 1957 and 1968. This action was taken because of concerns that church funds were being used for the private gain of its founder L. Ron Hubbard or due to an international psychiatric conspiracy against Scientology.
Elizabeth MacDonald is an American financial journalist working for Fox Business. MacDonald used to work for The Wall Street Journal and as a senior editor at Forbes magazine. She won a Gerald Loeb Award for her work in magazines.
My father," Elliot Roosevelt observed of his famous parent, "may have been the originator of the concept of employing the IRS as a weapon of political retribution.