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Post by Daniel on Jun 9, 2016 8:56:52 GMT -5
IRS targeting scandal: We will not allow Team Obama to run out the clock
By Jay Sekulow
June 07, 2016
FoxNews.com
It’s a strategy the Obama administration has mastered – the 3-D strategy: Delay, Distract, and Deflect.
I cited that strategy in a post last month when a federal judge in Texas labelled the Obama Justice Department “unethical” and “intentionally deceptive” – calling out the biased behavior of government attorneys in defending President Obama’s unconstitutional Executive order on immigration, a case now pending before the U.S. Supreme Court.
This time it’s the Obama administration’s Internal Revenue Service (IRS) that’s back in the spotlight – implementing the 3-D strategy.
We have been in federal court since 2012 challenging the unconstitutional targeting by the IRS of conservative and Tea Party groups. This unlawful scheme was designed to punish organizations because of their conservative political beliefs.
In April, we were in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit presenting arguments on behalf of 38 organizations that we represent in our federal lawsuit. In arguments before the panel, the court was very critical of the IRS. As Judge David B. Sentelle put it: “It’s hard to find the IRS to be an agency we can trust.”
That’s very true. And, you can add that the IRS is an agency committed to concealing the truth and dedicated to delaying the release of information.
That’s why a recent revelation from another lawsuit challenging the IRS bias is so important. It took a series of orders from federal judges and the ongoing pressure of litigation to get the IRS to finally release a list of the organizations it has targeted. The government released the names of 426 organizations.
And, as the Washington Times reports, it’s clear that many groups were targeted simply because of their conservative-sounding names. According to the Washington Times: “Sixty of the groups on the list released last month have the word ‘tea’ in their name, 33 have ‘patriot,’ eight refer to the Constitution, and 13 have ‘912’ in their name — which is the monicker of a movement started by conservatives. Another 26 group names refer to ‘liberty,’ though that list does include some groups that are not discernibly conservative in orientation.”
With the release of this list, I am certain the IRS will use this occasion to once again claim that the targeting is over -- a claim it has made now for several years.
But, that assertion is simply nonsense. The fact is that we still represent two groups that have not been approved by the IRS.
continue reading
www.foxnews.com/opinion/2016/06/07/irs-targeting-scandal-will-not-allow-team-obama-to-run-out-clock.html
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Post by Daniel on Aug 8, 2016 16:54:25 GMT -5
ACLJ Wins Significant Victory Against the Obama Administration’s IRS Targeting
By Jay Sekulow
We just secured a major victory in federal appeals court against the Obama Administration’s IRS. The court unequivocally agreed with our position that the IRS’s targeting of conservatives has not ended and that our clients – numerous conservative, Tea Party, and pro-life groups – deserve to have their day in court.
Just hours ago, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit issued a decision in our IRS targeting scandal case, affirming in part and reversing in part the district court’s decision of dismissal, and remanding the case for further proceedings on all constitutional claims.
In its opinion, the appellate court agreed that the district court’s decision dismissing our clients’ – thirty-eight non-profit organizations from twenty-two states subjected to numerous violations of their First Amendment rights – claims was made in error on the unfounded position that the IRS had since ceased all allegedly illegal activity.
The court was quick to criticize the IRS’s absurd arguments that it had voluntarily ceased all illegal activity, stating unequivocally in the opinion that “voluntary cessation [by the IRS of the alleged illegal activity] has never occurred.”
continue reading
aclj.org/free-speech/aclj-wins-significant-victory-against-the-obama-administrations-irs-targeting
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Post by Daniel on Aug 11, 2016 20:03:36 GMT -5
Obama Administration IRS Scandal Back in the News
By Roger Aronoff August 11, 2016
The mainstream media have gone to great lengths to avoid reporting on controversies with the potential to damage President Obama’s reputation or legacy. The endeavor to politicize the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) became an article of impeachment against Richard Nixon in 1974. But the actual politicization of the IRS under Barack Obama is treated as a phony scandal ginned up by Fox News, talk radio and the tea party movement. So it’s no surprise that recent news stories about the IRS scandal have been met with nearly complete silence from the mainstream media. The goal is clear: if the media ignore this scandal long enough, it will be treated and dismissed as old news.
There was a major development last Friday, but the media, for the most part, continue to look the other way. As The Washington Times reported, “A federal appeals court slapped the IRS with yet another rebuke Friday, ruling that it did, in fact, discriminate against tea party groups and insisting the tax agency prove that it’s permanently stopped the unconstitutional targeting of groups because of their political leanings.”
The IRS was seeking to get a lawsuit dropped, claiming they had voluntarily stopped such targeting. But a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit—considered the second most powerful court after the U.S. Supreme Court—ruled unanimously that the lawsuit should be sent back to a lower court for a more thorough ruling. In a previous ruling earlier in the year, Judge David Sentelle, one of the members of the three-judge panel, said, “It’s hard to find the IRS to be an agency we can trust,” and suggested that it had infringed on the constitutional rights of some tea party groups.
continue reading
www.breakingisraelnews.com/73732/obama-administration-irs-scandal-back-news-opinion/
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Post by Daniel on Oct 18, 2016 20:21:54 GMT -5
Major Victory: IRS Ordered to Issue Outstanding Determinations & Answer for Political Targeting of Citizens
By Jay Sekulow
Three years after we filed a lawsuit on their behalf, and for some, nearly seven years after they submitted their applications for tax-exempt status, the grassroots conservative groups that were targeted by the IRS for their political views are finally receiving some of the relief to which they have long been entitled—determinations on those applications.
In early August, the federal appellate court for the District of Columbia Circuit held that the plaintiffs who filed suit in Linchpins of Liberty, et al. v. United States, et al. in 2013 had set forth allegations sufficient to obtain actual evidence about the IRS’s targeting of conservative tax-exempt applicants based on their names and political positions. The D.C. Circuit thus reversed the decision of the district court (which had previously dismissed the claims on the grounds that the IRS had apparently ceased the targeting conduct) and sent the case back to the lower court, explaining that the IRS had failed to demonstrate that either the targeting scheme, or its effects on plaintiffs, had actually ended.
Last week, District Judge Reggie B. Walton held a status conference to resume the lower court proceedings in the case. While the IRS’s attorney once again took the position that most of the claims are moot because most of the plaintiff organizations have received determinations, the court picked up where the D.C. Circuit left off, and ordered that the IRS cease delaying determinations on any outstanding tax-exempt applications of Tea Party groups and other grassroots organizations. He gave the IRS thirty days to comply.
continue reading
aclj.org/free-speech/major-victory-irs-ordered-to-issue-outstanding-determinations-answer-for-political-targeting-of-citizens
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Post by Daniel on Nov 12, 2016 9:27:02 GMT -5
Continuing the Fight against IRS Corruption in Federal Court
By Jay Sekulow
As we continue our fight at the ACLJ against the lawless, unconstitutional Obama Administration’s IRS targeting of grassroots conservatives, we are achieving important victories.
But the fight also continues in federal court to ensure justice for all 38 of our clients from 22 states across the country. We must not stop fighting the IRS corruption until there is true justice and assurances that no American will ever be targeted by the IRS for his or her beliefs ever again.
Three of our remaining clients have received determinations from the IRS in recent weeks after a significant victory in which a federal judge ordered the IRS to issue determinations within 30 days.
Michigan-based Unite in Action – after waiting for more than six years – has been approved by the IRS.
continue reading
aclj.org/free-speech/continuing-the-fight-against-irs-corruption-in-federal-court
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Post by Daniel on Oct 29, 2017 10:00:13 GMT -5
Newsweek Prematurely Concludes IRS Scandal Was ‘Fake News’
by Brian McNicoll on October 27, 2017
It was just two-and-a-half weeks ago that Neil Buchanan wrote a piece for Newsweek that said the IRS scandal involving targeting of Tea Party groups “was fake news all along.”
“Do you remember ‘the IRS scandal?’ If you do, you remember a lie,” Buchanan began.
Buchanan’s news hook was a report from the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration, or TITGA, which, he asserted, “showed that the supposedly scandalous behavior never happened. In other words, the central lie behind this non-scandal has been definitively undermined.”
The report did not exactly clear the IRS. In fact, it said the agency targeted not just Tea Party groups but groups that support a wall on the border, health care or even marijuana legalization. It said it not only delayed their applications, it sought information on donors the groups are not required to turn over because of NAACP v. Alabama, a case in which the Democrats then governing Alabama sought donor rolls of the NAACP.
“The report reinforces that government watchdogs and congressional investigators have confirmed time and time again: Bureaucrats at the IRS, such as Lois Lerner, arbitrarily and haphazardly administered the tax code and targeted taxpayers based on political ideology,” said Rep. Kevin Brady (R.-Texas), chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee.
Buchanan called for former President Obama to take a “victory lap” because “after more than four years of Republicans’ efforts to backfill their absurd claims of a big political scandal, the entire story has (again) collapsed.”
more
www.aim.org/aim-column/newsweek-prematurely-concludes-irs-scandal-was-fake-news/
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Post by Daniel on Oct 29, 2017 10:10:09 GMT -5
VICTORY: In Proposed Settlement, IRS Admits Wrongdoing, Apologizes for Targeting Tea Party and Conservative Groups
By Jay Sekulow
We have just obtained a resounding victory in our legal challenge to the IRS’s political targeting of conservative organizations.
In an unprecedented victorious conclusion to our years-long legal battle against the IRS, the bureaucratic agency has just admitted in federal court that it wrongfully targeted Tea Party and conservative groups during the Obama Administration and issued an apology to our clients for doing so. In addition, the IRS is consenting to a court order that would prohibit it from ever engaging in this form of unconstitutional discrimination in the future.
In a proposed Consent Order filed with the Court yesterday, the IRS has apologized for its treatment of our clients (36 Tea Party and other conservative organizations from 20 states that applied for 501(c)(3) and (c)(4) tax-exempt status with the IRS between 2009 and 2012) during the tax-exempt determinations process. Crucially, following years of denial by the IRS and blame-shifting by IRS officials, the agency now expressly admits that its treatment of our clients was wrong.
As set forth in the proposed Order:
The IRS admits that its treatment of Plaintiffs during the tax-exempt determinations process, including screening their applications based on their names or policy positions, subjecting those applications to heightened scrutiny and inordinate delays, and demanding of some Plaintiffs’ information that TIGTA determined was unnecessary to the agency’s determination of their tax-exempt status, was wrong. For such treatment, the IRS expresses its sincere apology.
Upon approval by the court, entry of the Order will mark the end of a four-year legal battle initiated by the ACLJ on behalf of forty-one conservative organizations targeted by the IRS for their political viewpoints.
Throughout litigation of this case, we have remained committed to protecting the rights of our clients who faced unlawful and discriminatory action by the IRS. Our objective from the very beginning has been to hold the IRS accountable for its corrupt practices.
continued..
aclj.org/free-speech/victory-in-proposed-settlement-irs-admits-wrongdoing-apologizes-for-targeting-tea-party-and-conservative-groups
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