Transcripts of the interviews, viewed Wednesday by The Wall Street Journal, appear to contradict earlier statements by top IRS officials, who have blamed lower-level workers in Cincinnati.
Elizabeth Hofacre said her office in Cincinnati sought help from IRS officials in the Washington unit that oversees tax-exempt organizations after she started getting the tea-party cases in April 2010. Ms. Hofacre said Carter Hull, an IRS lawyer in Washington, closely oversaw her work and suggested some of the questions asked applicants.

“I was essentially a front person, because I had no autonomy or no authority to act on [applications] without Carter Hull’s influence or input,” she said, according to the transcripts.

 dogma wrote:
Were those questions being asked before, or after cases came up for further review?

 whembly wrote:

 dogma wrote:
Were those questions being asked before, or after cases came up for further review?

Not being snarky... but does it matter? It just shows that it wasn't "all low-level employees".

 whembly wrote:

 dogma wrote:
Were those questions being asked before, or after cases came up for further review?

Not being snarky... but does it matter? It just shows that it wasn't "all low-level employees".

 Gentleman_Jellyfish wrote:
Dogma confirmed for Obama

 Frazzled wrote:
Its entirely possible, but irrelevant insofar as the efficacy of the IRS doing such. That only goes to mens rea and blame.

 Frazzled wrote:

Firing everyone would take care of that nicely.

 Frazzled wrote:
You're right. thats not relevant -again.
The issue is whether the IRS followed appropriate administrative law in how it pursued these audits...

 Frazzled wrote:

...whether those audits were in line with appropriate standards, code, and the law...

 Frazzled wrote:

...and whether the triggering of those audits was done with intent to target a specific group.

 whembly wrote:
IRS staffers were directed by Washington IRS management.-

http://live.wsj.com/video/irs-staff-cite-washington-link-and-more/10E02EA8-347F-40D2-A7FD-4CD3F1552092.html#!10E02EA8-347F-40D2-A7FD-4CD3F1552092
Here's an excerpt:

Transcripts of the interviews, viewed Wednesday by The Wall Street Journal, appear to contradict earlier statements by top IRS officials, who have blamed lower-level workers in Cincinnati.
Elizabeth Hofacre said her office in Cincinnati sought help from IRS officials in the Washington unit that oversees tax-exempt organizations after she started getting the tea-party cases in April 2010. Ms. Hofacre said Carter Hull, an IRS lawyer in Washington, closely oversaw her work and suggested some of the questions asked applicants.

“I was essentially a front person, because I had no autonomy or no authority to act on [applications] without Carter Hull’s influence or input,” she said, according to the transcripts.

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:
Interesting, the few-rogue-low-level-employees excuse is looking slightly more threadbare.

 dogma wrote:

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:
Interesting, the few-rogue-low-level-employees excuse is looking slightly more threadbare.

When was it claimed that they were "rogue"?

Acting commissioner Steven Miller called the employees "rogue" and said they were responsible for "overly aggressive" handling of the requests over the past two years

 dogma wrote:

 Dreadclaw69 wrote:
Interesting, the few-rogue-low-level-employees excuse is looking slightly more threadbare.

When was it claimed that they were "rogue"?

 djones520 wrote:

When the news broke maybe?

 whembly wrote:

Right at the beginning... when Loris Lerner apologied

 dogma wrote:

 djones520 wrote:

When the news broke maybe?

The news broke on May 10th, not may 15th.

But fair enough, Steven Miller did use the word "rogue".

 whembly wrote:

Right at the beginning... when Loris Lerner apologied

No, that's wrong. Lois Lerner's "apology" was made several days before the use of the word "rogue".

At any rate, the argument still seems to be "I don't know anything about the 501(c) section of the tax code!" with a dash of "Lol, Democrats are evil!"

 djones520 wrote:

Well at the time of the apology, there were blaming low level guys working outside of the pervue of higher level employees. The actual term "rogue" may not have been used for a few days, but that is what they were building to. Dance around it however you want though.

 Grey Templar wrote:
Well, I would call a low level employee doing something without the supervision of a higher level employee that is also ostensibly something they would not approve of to be well within the definition of "rogue".

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Two Internal Revenue Service agents working in the agency's Cincinnati office say higher-ups in Washington directed the targeting of conservative political groups when they applied for tax-exempt status, a contention that directly contradicts claims made by the agency since the scandal erupted last month.
The Cincinnati agents didn't provide proof that senior IRS officials in Washington ordered the targeting. But one of the agents said her work processing the applications was closely supervised by a Washington lawyer in the IRS division that handles applications for tax-exempt status, according to a transcript of her interview with congressional investigators.
Her interview suggests a long trail of emails that could support her claim.
The revelation could prove to be significant if investigators are able to show that Washington officials were involved in singling out tea party and other conservative groups for extra scrutiny. IRS officials have said repeatedly that the targeting was initiated by front-line agents in the Cincinnati office and was stopped once senior officials in Washington found out.
A yearlong audit by the agency's inspector general found no evidence that Washington officials ordered or authorized the targeting. However, the inspector general blamed ineffective management by senior IRS officials for allowing the targeting to continue for nearly two years during the 2010 and 2012 elections.
Since the revelations were made public last month, much of the agency's top leadership has been replaced. President Barack Obama forced acting IRS Commissioner Steven Miller to resign, replacing him with Danny Werfel, a former White House budget official who is conducting a review of the agency's operations.
Three congressional committees and the Justice Department are also investigating. Investigators for the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee and the House Ways and Means Committee have interviewed at least four IRS workers as part of their probe.
The Associated Press viewed transcripts of interviews with two IRS agents working in the Cincinnati office.
Gary Muthert, an IRS agent there, said his local supervisor told him in March 2010 to check the applications for tax-exempt status to see how many were from groups with "tea party" in their names. The supervisor's name was blacked out in the transcript.
"He told me that Washington, D.C., wanted some cases," Muthert said of his supervisor.
Muthert said he came up with fewer than 10 applications. But after checking some of the group's websites, he noticed similar groups with "patriots' or "9-12 project" in their names, so he started looking for applications that mentioned those terms too.
Over a two-month period, Muthert said he found about 40 applications that mentioned tea party, patriots or 9-12 project — the latter being groups which aspire to reinstill a post-9/11 spirit of unity in the country.
"I used 'patriots' because some of the tea partiers wouldn't, they would shorten their name to TP Patriots," Muthert said. "I thought, OK, I will use 'patriot.'"
Muthert said his supervisor told him that someone in Washington wanted to see seven of the applications, so Muthert prepared the files.
Whom did you send them to? An investigator asked.
"I don't know," Muthert answered.
Muthert did not respond to requests by the AP for comment.
The IRS was screening the groups' applications because agents were trying to determine their level of political activity. IRS regulations say tax-exempt social welfare organizations may engage in some political activity but the activity may not be their primary mission. It is up to the IRS to make that determination.
Elizabeth Hofacre, also an agent in the Cincinnati office, told investigators she was in charge of processing applications from tea party groups — once they were selected by other agents — from April 2010 to October 2010. Hofacre said her supervisor in Cincinnati, whose name was blacked out in the transcript, told her to handle the applications.
But, she said, an IRS lawyer in Washington, Carter Hull, micromanaged her work and ultimately delayed the processing of applications by tea party groups.
Hull is a lawyer in the division that handles applications for tax-exempt status. But, Hofacre said, his interest in the cases was highly unusual.
"It was demeaning," she said. "One of the criteria is to work independently and do research and make decisions based on your experience and education, whereas on this case, I had no autonomy at all through the process."
Hofacre said Hull signed off on letters she sent to the groups asking them for additional information and then reviewed their responses. Hofacre complained that Hull was slow to sign off on the letters.
"All I remember saying and thinking is, 'This is ridiculous.' Because at the same time, you are getting calls from irate taxpayers. And I see their point," Hofacre said.
Hofacre said she became so frustrated with the delays that she applied for a different job within the agency and transferred in October 2010.
Neither Hofacre nor Hull responded to requests for comment.

A yearlong audit by the agency's inspector general found no evidence that Washington officials ordered or authorized the targeting. However, the inspector general blamed ineffective management by senior IRS officials for allowing the targeting to continue for nearly two years during the 2010 and 2012 elections.

 dogma wrote:
Why didn't Dreadclaw69 underline this...

A yearlong audit by the agency's inspector general found no evidence that Washington officials ordered or authorized the targeting. However, the inspector general blamed ineffective management by senior IRS officials for allowing the targeting to continue for nearly two years during the 2010 and 2012 elections.

...I am wondering.

Cincinnati IRS staffer: D.C. showed interest in Tea Party cases

An IRS staffer in Cincinnati told congressional investigators that a Washington official was the driving force behind the targeting of Tea Party organizations in 2010, and showed unprecedented interest in those groups’ tax-exempt applications.

Elizabeth Hofacre, the Cincinnati staffer, said that she started receiving applications from Tea Party groups to sift through in April, 2010. Hofacre’s handling of those cases, she said, was highly influenced by Carter Hull, an IRS lawyer in Washington.

Hofacre said that she integrated questions from Hull into her follow-ups with Tea Party groups, and that Hull had to approve the letters seeking more information that she sent out to those organizations. That process, she said, was both unusual and “demeaning.”

“One of the criteria is to work independently and do research and make decisions based on your experience and education,” Hofacre said, according to transcripts reviewed by The Hill. “Whereas in this case, I had no autonomy at all through the process.”

“I thought it was over the top,” she added, in interviews held by investigators in both parties from the House Oversight and Ways and Means committees. “I am not sure where it came from, but it was a bit unusual.”

Hofacre, who oversaw Tea Party applications from April, 2010, to October, 2010, said Hull eventually became slow to endorse her letters. She eventually took another position within the IRS that year, after dealing with what she called “irate” applicants.

“And I see their point,” Hofacre said. “Even if a decision isn’t favorable, they deserve some kind of treatment and they deserve, you know, timeliness.”

The investigators’ interviews with Hofacre and another Cincinnati staffer, Gary Muthert, cast some doubt on statements from the former acting IRS commissioner, Steven Miller, and other agency officials that the targeting of Tea Party groups was limited to Cincinnati.

They also show the tension that developed between officials in Cincinnati and Washington, especially after Lois Lerner – the D.C.-based director at the center of the targeting storm – placed the responsibility for the singling out on the Ohio office. Lerner was the IRS official who first disclosed, and apologized for, the targeting.

Hofacre told investigators that officials trying to blame the Cincinnati office were misleading the public on purpose.

“I was appalled and I was infuriated,” Hofacre said. "Because they are inaccurate, and everybody that has been making those statements should know they are inaccurate.”

Still, the interviews also contain few answers on who exactly ordered the targeting, and contain no suggestions that White House or Treasury officials – or even the top IRS brass – knew about the extra scrutiny.

Treasury’s inspector general for tax administration found that the IRS inappropriately screened for Tea Party groups seeking tax-exempt status, asked them inappropriate questions and kept some waiting for years for a verdict.

In addition to the congressional inquest, the tax administration inspector general is further investigating the targeting, as is the Justice Department.

The controversy swirling around the IRS has also only grown since the inspector general's report came out almost a month ago, with a separate audit finding that the agency spent more than $4 million on a single conference in 2010.

Muthert told investigators that he started collecting Tea Party applications in March, 2010, and eventually sent seven cases to Washington after hearing officials there had shown an interest in those applications.

The number of cases he found ultimately grew from less than 10 to roughly 40, after broadening his search beyond “Tea Party” to include “patriots” and “9/12.”
Hofacre, the Cincinnati staffer charged with dealing with the Tea Party applications after they were found, said the 20 cases she was originally given mushroomed into 40 to 60.

Hofacre's Ohio-based supervisor directed her to deal with the Tea Party cases. But it was unusual, Hofacre told investigators, for one agent to have such exclusive oversight of applications from one type of organization.

The Cincinnati staffer also said that the letters she sent to follow up with Tea Party groups asked for information about the groups’ rallies, emails and web sites.
Those questions, developed after her consultations with Hull, were pretty standard, Hofacre said.

But Hofacre added that she found one request from Washington – that they press groups for information on contracts they might have in the future – to be odd.
She also said that some requests she suggested came after she stopped working Tea Party cases in 2010 – like for donor lists – were “appalling."

Nearly six in 10 Americans believe that high-ranking IRS officials in Washington were aware the IRS had a practice of targeting conservative political groups for greater scrutiny in recent years. One-quarter think knowledge of this was mainly limited to the agency’s office in Cincinnati where the mishandled applications for tax-exempt status were processed.

 whembly wrote:
*sigh*

See this

 whembly wrote:

Also this...the “low-level employee” defense is crumbling in both fact and perception.

The IRS Can't Plead Incompetence
If the agency didn't know what it was doing, it wouldn't have done it so well.

Quickly: Everyone agrees the Internal Revenue Service is, under current governmental structures, the proper agency to determine the legitimacy of applications for tax-exempt status. Everyone agrees the IRS has the duty to scrutinize each request, making sure that the organization meets relevant criteria. Everyone agrees groups requesting tax-exempt status must back up their requests with truthful answers and honest information.

Some ask, "Don't conservatives know they have to be questioned like anyone else?" Yes, they do. Their grievance centers on the fact they have not been. They were targeted, and their rights violated.

The most compelling evidence of that is what happened to the National Organization for Marriage. Its chairman, John Eastman, testified before the House Ways and Means Committee, and the tale he told was different from the now-familiar stories of harassment and abuse.

In March 2012, the organization, which argues the case for traditional marriage, found out its confidential tax information had been obtained by the Human Rights Campaign, one of its primary opponents in the marriage debate. The HRC put the leaked information on its website—including the names of NOM donors. The NOM not only has the legal right to keep its donors' names private, it has to, because when contributors' names have been revealed in the past they have been harassed, boycotted and threatened. This is a free speech right, one the Supreme Court upheld in 1958 after the state of Alabama tried to compel the NAACP to surrender its membership list.

The NOM did a computer forensic investigation and determined that its leaked IRS information had come from within the IRS itself. If it was leaked by a worker or workers within the IRS it would be a federal crime, with penalties including up to five years in prison.

In April 2012, the NOM asked the IRS for an investigation. The inspector general's office gave them a complaint number. Soon they were in touch. Even though the leaked document bore internal IRS markings, the inspector general decided that maybe the document came from within the NOM. The NOM demonstrated that was not true.

For the next 14 months they heard nothing about an investigation. By August 2012, the NOM was filing Freedom of Information Act requests trying to find out if there was one. The IRS stonewalled. Their "latest nonresponse response," said Mr. Eastman, claimed that the law prohibiting the disclosure of confidential tax returns also prevents disclosure of information about who disclosed them. Mr. Eastman called this "Orwellian." He said that what the NOM experienced "suggests that problems at the IRS are potentially far more serious" than the targeting of conservative organizations for scrutiny.

In hearings Thursday, Rep. Elijah Cummings, a Maryland Democrat who disagrees with the basic stand of the NOM, said that what had happened to the organization was nonetheless particularly offensive to him. The new IRS director agreed he would look into it.

Almost a month after the IRS story broke—a month after the high-profile scandal started to unravel after a botched spin operation that was meant to make the story go away—no one has been able to produce a liberal or progressive group that was targeted and thwarted by the agency's tax-exemption arm in the years leading up to the 2012 election. The House Ways and Means Committee this week held hearings featuring witnesses from six of the targeted groups. Before the hearing, Republicans invited Democrats to include witnesses from the other side. The Democrats didn't produce one. The McClatchy news service also looked for nonconservative targets. "Virtually no organizations perceived to be liberal or nonpartisan have come forward to say they were unfairly targeted," it reported. Liberal groups told McClatchy "they thought the scrutiny they got was fair."

Some sophisticated Democrats who've worked in executive agencies have suggested to me that the story is simpler than it seems—that the targeting wasn't a political operation, an expression of political preference enforced by an increasingly partisan agency, its union and assorted higher-ups. A former senior White House official, and a very bright man, said this week he didn't believe it was mischief but incompetence. But why did all the incompetent workers misunderstand their jobs and their mission in exactly the same way? Wouldn't general incompetence suggest both liberal and conservative groups would be abused more or less equally, or in proportion to the number of their applications? Wouldn't a lot of left-wing groups have been caught in the incompetence net? Wouldn't we now be hearing honest and aggrieved statements from indignant progressives who expected better from their government?

Some person or persons made the decision to target, harass, delay and abuse. Some person or persons communicated the decision. Some persons executed them. Maybe we're getting closer. John McKinnon and Dionne Searcey of The Wall Street Journal reported this week that IRS employees in the Cincinnati office—those are the ones that tax-exempt unit chief Lois Lerner accused of going rogue and attempted to throw under the bus—have told congressional investigators that agency officials in Washington helped direct the probe of the tea-party groups. Mr. McKinnon and Ms. Searcey reported that one of the workers told investigators an IRS lawyer in Washington, Carter Hull, "closely oversaw her work and suggested some of the questions asked applicants."

"The IRS didn't respond to a request for comment," they wrote. There really is an air about the IRS that they think they are The Untouchables.

Some have said the IRS didn't have enough money to do its job well. But a lack of money isn't what makes you target political groups—a directive is what makes you do that. In any case, this week's bombshell makes it clear the IRS, from 2010 to 2012, the years of prime targeting, did have money to improve its processes. During those years they spent $49 million on themselves—on conferences and gatherings, on $1,500 hotel rooms and self-esteem presentations. "Maliciously self-indulgent," said Chairman Darrell Issa at Thursday's House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearings.

What a culture of entitlement, and what confusion it reveals about what motivates people. You want to increase the morale, cohesion and self-respect of IRS workers? Allow them to work in an agency that is famous for integrity, fairness and professionalism. That gives people spirit and guts, not "Star Trek" parody videos.

Finally, this week Russell George, the inspector general whose audit confirmed the targeting of conservative groups, mentioned, as we all do these days, Richard Nixon's attempt to use the agency to target his enemies. But part of that Watergate story is that Nixon failed. Last week David Dykes of the Greenville (S.C.) News wrote of meeting with 93-year-old Johnnie Mac Walters, head of the IRS almost 40 years ago, in the Nixon era. Mr. Dykes quoted Tim Naftali, former director of the Nixon Presidential Library and Museum, who told him the IRS wouldn't do what Nixon asked: "It didn't happen, not because the White House didn't want it to happen, but because people like Johnnie Walters said 'no.' "

That was the IRS doing its job—attempting to be above politics, refusing to act as the muscle for a political agenda.

Man—those were the days.

 Frazzled wrote:
Looks like the EPA gave out the names of 80,000 farmers to left wing causes.

http://foxnewsinsider.com/2013/06/10/epa-leaks-names-farmers-left-wing-environmentalists-megyn-kelly-michelle-malkin-react

 whembly wrote:



cliff notes: IRS illegally leaked the National Organization for Marriage's (NOM) donor lists to its political opponent, Human Rights Watch.

This is stupendously illegal.

NOM wants to know which IRS agent did this.

The IRS is claiming they can't tell NOM who illegally leaked confidential information, because the law forbidding the disclosure of confidential information also protects the confidentiality of those who illegally leak such information!
o.O

 Frazzled wrote:
Looks like the EPA gave out the names of 80,000 farmers to left wing causes.

http://foxnewsinsider.com/2013/06/10/epa-leaks-names-farmers-left-wing-environmentalists-megyn-kelly-michelle-malkin-react

A bipartisan group of 24 senators has sent a letter to the EPA, demanding that the agency explain why it leaked the names and personal information of more than 80,000 farmers and ranchers to left-wing organizations. In April, the EPA admitted the information had leaked in a story broken by FoxNews.com.

According to the report, the information on livestock and produce farmers was sought through a Freedom of Information Act request by the groups Earth Justice, the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Pew Charitable Trust. They were given information on roughly 80,000 farmers and ranchers, though the EPA later said it made a mistake by releasing the information.

One Nebraska rancher said his address was published, expressing concern that environmental "extremists" - upset over possible water pollution by livestock producers - could target his farm.

Megyn Kelly took the latest scandal involving the Obama EPA with Michelle Malkin, who said it's no wonder these types of things keep happening.

In a ridiculous follow-up, the EPA then asked the left-wing groups to return the information that was mistakenly released. Pew Charitable Trust said they returned it, but it's unclear about the other two groups.

"Oopsy! How do these things just keep happening? The scandal never stops when the fish rots from the top. ... Whatever fishing expedition these left-wing groups were on - and we're talking about the most radical green groups that have a decades-long history of targeting their opponents, whether it's free-market environmentalists or these ranchers who are trying to make a living in America - there was something very smelly going on here," said Malkin.

 dogma wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
Well, I would call a low level employee doing something without the supervision of a higher level employee that is also ostensibly something they would not approve of to be well within the definition of "rogue".

So you would call any form of delegation "rogue"?