IRS Scrutiny Extended Beyond Tea Party Groups


It has not been a good past few days for the IRS. After admitting that Tea Party groups were inappropriately targeted during the 2012 election cycle the IRS apologized and the White House said that the unfair scrutiny was unjustified. The apology was rejected by Tea Party groups, and it now turns out that other groups were also inappropriately targeted by the IRS.
Groups that were targeted in addition to Tea Party groups include organizations that aim to teach people about how to "make America a better place to live," which naturally ought to raise suspicions.
From CNN:
Washington (CNN) -- The Internal Revenue Service targeted other groups focused on government spending and the federal debt that were seeking tax-exempt status, in addition to tea party organizations, documents set to be released this week by the agency's watchdog show.
The IRS also applied extra scrutiny to applicants with statements that "criticize how the country is run" or that sought to educate the public on how to "make America a better place to live" -- designations that would have included conservative political groups looking to apply for 501(c)(4) status.
Follow this story and more at Reason 24/7.
Spice up your blog or Website with Reason 24/7 news and Reason articles. You can get the widgets here. If you have a story that would be of interest to Reason's readers please let us know by emailing the 24/7 crew at 24_7@reason.com, or tweet us stories at @reason247.
Editor's Note: As of February 29, 2024, commenting privileges on reason.com posts are limited to Reason Plus subscribers. Past commenters are grandfathered in for a temporary period. Subscribe here to preserve your ability to comment. Your Reason Plus subscription also gives you an ad-free version of reason.com, along with full access to the digital edition and archives of Reason magazine. We request that comments be civil and on-topic. We do not moderate or assume any responsibility for comments, which are owned by the readers who post them. Comments do not represent the views of reason.com or Reason Foundation. We reserve the right to delete any comment and ban commenters for any reason at any time. Comments may only be edited within 5 minutes of posting. Report abuses.
Please
to post comments
IRS 1: "Well, we did do the nose..."
IRS 2: "..and the wart."
IRS 1: "The nose and the wart. But....WITCH!"
IRS 2: "She's a WITCH!!!"
To be fair, if some group actually described their goal to me as "making America a better place to live", I'd suspect they were con artists.
That's why I'm skeptical of government. The bait politicians use on a daily basis is that if we just let Top. Men. do their thing, America would be a better place to live. That they are demonstrably wrong means nothing to most.
Well, you can't just let people govern themselves, they're too immoral and irresponsible.
They have to be governed by other people, who then magically become super moral and responsible.
Don't you see how this works?
If I heard some group describing their goal as "making America a better place to live" I'd immediately suspect that they were some sort of left-wing group of the progressive-nanny-state or liberal-fascist ilk.
Now if they went after groups with the word "fair" in it - that would totally shutdown the leftist activist industry.
OT: MILFs unite!
Moro Islamic Liberation Front that is.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new.....pines.html
I think the MILFs misspelled Moron
Damn, the MILFs are coming!
Huh, didn't know that Wesley Snipes was let go from Federal prison last month:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/ro.....ns-remain/
but not yet free (transferred to the New York Community Corrections Office for home confinement until July 19th)
Still waiting for Erwin Schiff though...
Only people who think taxes should be higher should be exempt from taxes.
And people without alt-text should be taxed double.
Report by emergency manager says Detroit's finances are crumbling, future is bleak
Um...are there any union towns that are prospering? Are there any union states that are prospering? I'm not one to draw conclusions based upon correlation, but I can pose one hell of a hypothesis from it.
Study anyone?
We all better hope there's nothing in Obamacare about the IRS and access to medical records. Not just health insurance compliance but actual records.
Every group and individual that pays taxes has been unfairly targeted by the IRS.