IRS Officials Continue to Obstruct in Tea Party Targeting Case

IRS Officials Continue to Obstruct in Tea Party Targeting Case

It has been almost five years since news broke that officials at the IRS used the power of government to harass members of the Tea Party and other conservative groups.

The media has largely ignored the scandal and so far, no one has gone to jail. Earlier this month, IRS officials claimed they couldn’t testify because their lives were at risk.

USA Today reported:

IRS officials say lives at risk in tea party bias case

Details about tea party bias claims against the IRS could remain secret because current and former agency officials say their lives are in danger if they publicly testify about the case.

Lois Lerner and Holly Paz both have argued in recent court filings that the threat to their lives outweighs the public’s right to hear their testimony about how IRS employees in Cincinnati and Washington, D.C., handled applications for tax-exempt status from tea party groups.

They recently filed evidence to support their claim under seal in U.S. District Court in Cincinnati. Though that evidence has not been made public, court records indicate it relates to death threats and other harassment the women say they endured after their names were connected to the bias claims against the IRS several years ago.

“This documentation, as the court will see, makes very personal references and contains graphic, profane and disturbing language that would lead to unnecessary intrusion and embarrassment if made public,” their attorneys argued in a recent court brief. “Public dissemination of their deposition testimony would put their lives in serious jeopardy.”

Are we to believe that members of the Tea Party have threatened the lives of IRS workers? Is it more likely that IRS workers mean their freedom is at risk if they tell the truth?

The leader of one conservative group is speaking out about this.

Rachel del Guidice writes at the Daily Signal:

What a Tea Party Leader Thinks of Lois Lerner’s Latest Move in Court

One tea party leader is still looking for answers from the IRS.

Lawyers for Lois Lerner, who resigned under fire as a division chief at the Internal Revenue Service, argue that more details of her reported targeting of tea party groups should not be revealed because her safety is in danger.

But Catherine Engelbrecht, founder of True the Vote, a nonpartisan organization dedicated to election integrity, said she wants to see such documentation released.

True the Vote was one of hundreds of conservative, nonprofit organizations whose applications for tax-exempt status were unfairly slowed or spiked by the IRS, and Engelbrecht said she intends to see the details come out.

“My position on this is just ‘Tell the truth,’” Engelbrecht said in an email to The Daily Signal. “Tell it publicly, there’s been enough covering up, there’s been enough rumor and innuendo, there’s been enough passing the buck.”

Lerner and Holly Paz, another former IRS official involved in the scandal, recently filed papers in U.S. District Court in Cincinnati, seeking to keep secret certain IRS practices they discussed in depositions taken in a lawsuit filed by tea party groups against the government.

Trump has been in office less than four months and there are already countless official investigations.

Almost five years on and there’s been no justice of any kind in the IRS scandal.

It’s infuriating.

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