Tax Notes Look at IRS Tea Party Episode 10 years Later

Tax Notes has a look back at the IRS Tea Party episode 10-years later. I note I am quoted a good bit in this piece.

From the story:

“Ten years after the IRS acknowledged it had inappropriately given extra scrutiny to applications for tax-exempt status submitted by conservative organizations, debate continues as to what happened and how things stand today, with observers on the political right and left suggesting that more guidance on exempt organizations and political activity could help prevent such controversies from happening again.

Although passions seem less intense than they were in 2013 and beyond after then-IRS Exempt Organizations Director Lois Lerner acknowledged the agency had mishandled the exemption applications of Tea Party groups and other right-of-center nonprofits seeking section 501(c)(4) status, strong opinions about the episode persist and sometimes are voiced during debates about the IRS.

In January 2023 Rep. Jason Smith, R-Mo., following his election as chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, said the IRS has “a history of targeting conservative Americans.”

In March, in an online post attacking an IRS visit to the home of a journalist who was testifying before Congress about the weaponization of the federal government, the Center for Individual Freedom said the visit was made by “the same IRS that deliberately targeted conservative and pro-Israel nonprofit organizations under disgraced former director Lois Lerner.”

Philip Hackney