One compelling piece of evidence is that the IRS had expansive program targeting and intimidating conservatives around the country from Laguna Niguel, California to Washington D.C. What's worse is that despite the Obama Administration's claim that this was simply a case of a few IRS agents going rouge, we now know that 88 IRS employees was involved in this matter. There were also emails from a low level employee who was corresponding with Washington-based IRS tax attorney Carter Hull back in 2010. Furthermore, a few different IRS agents have suggested that the idea of targeting came from Washington D.C. Yet, other IRS agents refuse to say anything about whether that order came from their agency headquarters.
Another piece of evidence is the glaring fact that liberal groups were not targeted for extra scrutiny by the IRS. This demolishes the claim that the IRS was engaging in a neutral and balanced assessment of organizations applying for tax exempt status especially when we find that Obama's Organizing For America organization had applied to the IRS for that tax exemption.
So far, there’s no evidence that the White House or President Barack
Obama were involved in the IRS scrutinizing overtly political groups
applying for tax-exempt status. However, that may may change. We know that President Obama met with Douglas H. Shulman, the former IRS commissioner, over 150 times at the White House. That is highly unusual. But the most damning piece of evidence that may link Obama to the IRS scandal is his meeting with Colleen Kelley who is the President of the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) at12:30pm on March 31st. The time of that meeting is significant and is not a coincidence as Jeffery Lord points out in his article for he American Spectator.
The very next day after that March 31 meeting at the White House, the IRS, with the union involved in its decision-making, was setting up its “Sensitive Case Report on the Tea Party.”
Which raises the famous question from Watergate: What did the President know and when did he know it?
The famous question of when did the President know isn't the only question that the public should have answers to:
• Did the President himself ever discuss the Tea Party with Kelley?
• Did the President ever communicate his thoughts on the Tea Party to Kelley — in any fashion other than a face-to-face conversation such as e-mail, text, or by phone?
• What was the subject of the Obama-Kelley March 31, 2010 meeting?
• Who was present at the Obama-Kelley March 31 meeting?
• Was the Tea Party or any other group opposing the President’s agenda discussed at the March 31 meeting, or before or after that meeting?
• Is the White House going to release any e-mails, text, or phone records that detail Kelley’s contacts with not only Mr. Obama but his staff?
• Will the IRS release all e-mail, text, or phone records between Kelley or any other leader of the NTEU with IRS employees?
• What role did Executive Order 13522 play in the IRS investigations of the Tea Party and all these other conservative groups?
I highly encourage you to read Jeffrey Lord's article in its entirety. The fact that the President of the IRS Union meets with Obama the day before the targeting of conservative groups began may be the smoking gun that links Obama to this scandal. Congress should haul Colleen Kelley and grill her under oath. This meeting also is another reason why Congress should appoint an independent special prosecutor to investigate the entire IRS scandal.
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