From Fox News
The Trump administration, after years of litigation, has settled lawsuits with Tea Party and other conservative groups who say they were unfairly targeted by the IRS under the Obama administration.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced early Thursday that the Justice Department had entered into settlements with Tea Party groups whose tax-exempt status was significantly delayed by the IRS dating back to 2013, “based solely on their viewpoint or ideology.”
The settlements involve payments to the plaintiffs and an apology from the IRS.
The targeting scandal drew heavy attention in 2013 when the IRS admitted it applied extra scrutiny to conservative groups applying for nonprofit status. Lois Lerner, then head of the Exempt Organizations unit responsible, became the public face of the scandal, though other IRS officials were involved as well.
Sessions said that groups with names involving “Tea Party” or “Patriots,” or those with specific policy positions concerning government spending, were subject to “inappropriate criteria” to “screen” applications.
In addition, a federal judge has ordered the IRS to release the names of specific employees involved in targeting Tea Party groups:
A federal judge has ordered the Internal Revenue Service to release the names of specific employees involved in targeting Tea Party groups, after years of litigation over what conservatives have long called “chilling” behavior by one of the government’s “most feared” agencies.
Judge Reggie B. Walton of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia also said the IRS must provide information about which groups were targeted and why, along with a strategy to make sure such targeting doesn’t happen again.
The IRS is involved in multiple lawsuits with conservative groups related to the Tea Party targeting scandal; this particular case involves True the Vote.
“We’re thrilled the judge has taken this step and it feels good to have it recognized that they need to be held to account,” True the Vote President Catherine Engelbrecht told Fox News on Monday. “What happened to me was very personal—my name was thrown around the IRS, and the names of the people involved need to be known. What they did was criminal.”
Under Obama’s direction, the IRS didn’t have any trouble defining his preference of sympathetic leftwing groups over Tea Party/GOP organizations.
Obama met with top IRS official William Wilkins before the targeting began. As a matter of fact, a Cincinnati IRS employee testified that it was quite clear the orders came from D.C.
A rundown of IRS corruption under Lerner’s regime:
According to 2012 emails obtained by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, top Internal Revenue Service Obamacare official Sarah Hall Ingram discussed confidential taxpayer information with senior Obama White House officials.
Lois Lerner, then head of the IRS Tax Exempt Organizations division, also received an emailalongside White House officials that contained confidential information. More emails uncovered Lerner’s role in the conspiracy, including proof that she gave confidential taxpayer information to the FEC, violating federal law.
J. Christian Adams, the former DOJ attorney who blew the whistle on Holder’s refusal to prosecute the Black Panthers for voter intimidation, was himself targeted by the IRS for critical articles he published in Pajamas Media.
The IRS engaged in the deliberate suppression, harassment, and intimidation of patriotic and conservative groups, and those who focus on the Constitution and criticize government spending, with Obama’s blessing.
All of the IRS officials, including the new IRS Commissioner John Koskinen, have lied, spun, denied, and openly smirked at any attempt to get at the truth.
Bottom line: No one in the entire Obama regime, including the Corruptocrat-in-Chief is being held accountable for their crimes. Instead, they were paraded in front of Congressional hearings where hot air passes for real prosecution because the GOP lacked the balls to stop them.
The timeline of the IRS targeting scandal, HERE.
The transcripts of the testimonies, HERE
The next step should be charging Obama, Lerner, and Koskinen with the crimes they committed. But, we know that won’t happen.
Related articles:
http://freebeacon.com/issues/two-years-later-irs-locates-6924-documents-related-tea-party-targeting/
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