Joseph Heller wrote in Catch-22, “Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t after you.” As we learned in May, numerous conservative organizations (and yes, even a few liberal organizations), were correct in thinking they were being unfairly targeted by the government.
Making matters worse, the agency doing the targeting has a long, sordid history of targeting opponents of the incumbent administration: the IRS.
Investigations into the targeting revealed that America’s least favorite agency scrutinized groups applying for non-profit status using politically biased criteria for years. As if singling out groups with names containing the words “Tea Party” or “patriot” was not bad enough, in an attempt to change from overtly partisan to more general criteria, the IRS began targeting organizations with whose goal it was to “teach about the Constitution.”
Reactions to the scandal were mixed, and unfortunately, many campaign finance ‘reformers’ argued that the real problem was that the IRS was not invasive enough. They claimed, and continue to claim, that the real scandal is that the IRS was not tasked with investigating every non-profit applicant for political activity. In practice, this would have given the IRS more leeway to pick favorites by making the actual approval process more opaque. The IRS already abused its power investigating a few; there is real danger in giving the agency the power to review all groups.
The Heritage Foundation brought together a panel of experts yesterday to speak about the scandal and the impact it has had on political speech. Moderated by Hans A. von Spakovsky, the panel included Dr. John Eastman (Chairman, National Organization for Marriage), Cleta Mitchell (super lawyer, Foley & Lardner), and CCP Chairman Brad Smith:
Cleta Mitchell, who represents a number of groups whose applications were held up by the IRS, described the run-around she was given when trying to ascertain why the applications were delayed. One of her clients, True the Vote, sued the IRS three years after filing for 501(c)3 status, only to find that the IRS granted the status and filed a motion to dismiss the case early last week, before the suit (read: discovery) could move forward
True the Vote isn’t the only organization suing the IRS. Dr. Eastman’s organization, NOM, also represented by Mrs. Mitchell, is suing the IRS and several individual employees for releasing confidential donor information to the Human Rights Campaign. This list was then used to harass and intimidate the group’s donors.
Brad Smith analyzed the history of the IRS scandal, which you can view in this clip:
In his discussion, Smith clarified the misconception that “tax-exempt” organizations pay no taxes at all, or are receiving some kind of gift at the taxpayers’ expense. Contrary to misstatements by members of Congress and the media, the only tax these groups don’t pay is income tax on contributions, which has never been considered taxable income. Aside from this exemption, tax-exempt groups pay taxes much like any other corporation or business. They typically pay property taxes, sales taxes, utility taxes, and so on.
Smith also spoke to how the targeting neither began over night, nor did it begin in a vacuum. As you can see from the timeline below, the targeting was a result of a concerted effort by a number of organizations and politicians pressuring the IRS to take action against certain groups:
The three panelists in yesterday’s event have once again made us grimly aware of the grave abuses that occurred at the IRS, even as the national media has been concentrated on other issues. It’s no wonder that a Pew survey this year found that a majority of Americans believe the federal government “threatens their personal rights and freedoms.” Regardless of who is ultimately held accountable for this enormous overreach of government power, hopefully all sides of the political spectrum can come to terms with the amount of authority held by largely unaccountable federal bureaucrats over the marketplace of ideas.
We are comforted to know there exists a growing amount of knowledge as to what transpired. We can only hope that Congress will continue its investigation, that justice will be brought to those responsible, and that the IRS will no longer be tasked with policing political speech, so that a scandal like this will never happen again. That, however, will only happen if the deniers stop rejecting the truth and accept that this was not, in fact, a “phony scandal.”
