Issa Busted for Secret Meetings with Stay-Behind IRS Inspector General
FRI FEB 07, 2014 AT 09:39 AM PST
Issa Busted for Secret Meetings with Stay-Behind IRS Inspector General
by ericlewis0
We can't say Seymour Hersh didn't warn us. It's looking like the IRS Inspector General, J. Russell George, a Dubya appointee, is the ultimate stay-behind. In the middle of last year, he was caught meeting exclusively with Issa and his Goposaur gang to drum up phony IRS scandal claims. Well now, he's been caught doing the exact same thing, but regarding an IRS 'audit' of the Affordable Care Act.
Thank goodness for Rep. Elijah Cummings and Rep. Gerald Connelly, who wrote the 'honorable' IRS IG a letter, which he cc'ed to Issa, and is posted in full after the jump...
The Honorable J. Russell George
Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration
U.S. Department of the Treasury
City Center Building
1401 H Street, NW, Suite 469
Washington, D.C. 20005
Dear Mr. Inspector General:
We are writing to object strongly to your office’s repeated partisan meetings with Chairman Darrell Issa and his staff after intentionally excluding Democratic Committee Members and staff—particularly regarding matters that currently are under active investigation by both your office and this Committee.
We have been informed that your staff held an in-person meeting with Republican Committee staff in their offices on January 27, 2014. During this meeting, your staff discussed substantive information about a new audit your office has initiated on data security issues relating to the Affordable Care Act. Your staff also discussed specific documents relating to this audit that your office has obtained as part of its review.
According to subsequent accounts from your office, Chairman Issa’s staff forbade you from including any Democratic Committee Members or staff in that meeting, and your staff accepted these terms without even informing my office. Democratic staff became aware of this meeting only after it occurred.
These private, partisan meetings undermine your obligation as an Inspector General to conduct audits and investigations in a balanced and non-partisan manner. Your actions cause observers to question whether the scope of your new audit on the Affordable Care Act is being inappropriately influenced by Chairman Issa and his staff, similar to the way they influenced the scope of your audit on IRS screening of applicants for tax-exempt status.
In the case of your audit of tax-exempt applicants, we learned only after the fact that your staff held a private meeting and other communications with Chairman Issa’s staff that also excluded Democratic Committee Members and staff. As in this case, your staff discussed the scope and substance of that active audit with Republican staff without any knowledge or participation of Democratic Members or staff. You also had official correspondence with Chairman Issa that you failed to provide to any Democratic Committee Members.
Of course, Chairman Issa’s request for the review of tax-exempt applicants, as well as your office’s work on that audit, has come under severe criticism for focusing only on the treatment of conservative groups and failing to consider similar treatment of progressive groups. According to press accounts at the time, your Communications Director explained that this flaw was due to specific constraints placed on your office by Chairman Issa:
As for why the report failed to mention that progressive groups, along with tea party groups, had been placed on IRS so-called Be On The Lookout lists for special scrutiny, Karen Kraushaar, the communications director at the treasury inspector general’s office, said investigators had been constrained by their mission statement. House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) had specifically requested that investigators “narrowly focus on tea party organizations.” So they did just that, Kraushaar said.
Notwithstanding these explicit statements, you claimed in testimony before our Committee that your Communications Director was wrong. You had this exchange with Committee Member Gerry Connolly:
Rep. Connolly: Mr. George, there have been reports with respect to the scope of your audit or review, including by the spokesperson in your office, that you met with the chairman of this committee and, essentially, he helped limit the scope of the review.
Mr. George: That’s incorrect, sir.
Rep. Connolly: That is incorrect?
Mr. George: The report I did see, but that did not occur.
Rep. Connolly: So Karen Kraushaar, your spokesperson who quoted—who said, and I quote, that Darrell Issa had specifically requested that investigators, quote, “narrowly focus on Tea Party organizations,” unquote, so they did just that, according to Kraushaar, that is an inaccurate statement?
Mr. George: That is correct.
Rep. Connolly: On what basis would she make such a statement on your behalf to the press?
Mr. George: Well, it was not without my authorization, and she misspoke, sir.
We have stated repeatedly that this Committee exercises its greatest authority when we act in a bipartisan manner. Private meetings with Members of only one political party clearly risk influencing the scope of audits, the questions that are asked, and the ultimate results. In addition to having the appearance of partisanship and impropriety, they result in information being shared with only half of the Committee. All Committee Members need access to the same information to conduct a fair and responsible analysis of the facts.
For these reasons, we now have three requests:
(1) First, we ask that your office provide the Democratic staff with the same in-person briefing that was provided to Chairman Issa’s staff on January 27, as well as all information your office has shared with the Chairman’s staff on this matter to date.
(2) In addition, if the Committee continues to insist on a partisan approach that excludes Democrats, we believe it is your responsibility, as an Inspector General charged with conducting non-partisan reviews, to resist these tactics, and we request that you not consent to any terms that deny Members of one political party the opportunity to participate in briefings or meetings relating to your active audits or investigations.
(3) Finally, because you and your Communications Director have made conflicting publicstatements regarding your audit of tax-exempt applicants, please provide copies of all documents within TIGTA’s possession or control related to any statements made by Ms. Kraushaar in June 2013 relating to the audit of tax-exempt applicants, including all emails or other communications between you, Karen Kraushaar, or any other TIGTA employee.
Thank you for your cooperation with this request.
Sincerely,
Elijah E. Cummings Gerald Connolly
Ranking Member Ranking Member
Subcommittee on Government Operations
cc: The Honorable Darrell E. Issa, Chairman
http://democrats.oversight.house.gov/press-releases/cummings-and-connolly-object-to-irs-inspector-generals-repeated-private-meetings-with-house-republicans/
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/02/07/1275822/-Issa-Busted-for-Secret-Meetings-with-Stay-Behind-IRS-Inspector-General
= new reply since forum marked as read
if your name is Issa.
They say they are running the country like a business. Well have you noticed how horribly businesses are run these days? Look at Walmart. They pay the GOP to subsidize their company.
How to get all this on a bumper sticker is the problem. 
[font size=3]Leadership! "The Buck Stops HERE!" NO Excuses![/font]
Keeping all those crooked Bush Republican Appointments (and appointing MORE) and NOT cleaning house was a BAD idea that was pointed out by those who keep up with politics and are not suffering from Partisan Blindness here on DU in 2009
to the cacophony of HOWLS and rending of flesh among those who made all the excuses back then.
So NOW, it is OK to say, [font size=3]"Told Ya".[/font]
You will know them by their WORKS,
not by their excuses.
Nothing could be farther from the truth.
I like the man, his family, and helped to get him elected
in an area that can bring violent consequences to those who DO speak their mind.
THIS takes some courage where we currently live.
It is a risk to person and property.
Due to my 47 years of support, activism, gawd knows how much in donations, and GOTV for the Democratic Party,
I have EARNED the right to speak my mind about the decisions made by our Party leadership, some of which have harmed the Democratic Party by enabling a further Drift-to-the-Right AWAY from the principles and values for which I joined the Democratic Party so long ago.
I have EARNED the Right to a Voice in our Party,
and I can do so without hating,
though from reading DU, I have become aware that some of our members are incapable of distinguishing between that and "HATE" in their simplistic, childish, binary World.
That was before I read what you just wrote. I was going to be kind and say that I felt you truly believed that those of us who disagree were being disrespectful. That I could understand why it's hard to hear harsh words. Perhaps ask you what you would you would do if you were backed into a corner and surrounded people who wanted to destroy you.
Would you fight back with everything you had or would you try to "reason" with them hoping that they would see the light and back off. But saying that we're "making things up" and trying to bring him down no matter what just isn't true!
I don't want to be crass, but that comment just seems ludicrous when so many of us worked hard to get him elected. Maybe you don't understand how much we did to help him get elected after he became the nominee. It is true for some of us he wasn't our first choice, but we DID get on the band wagon and hit the streets. It's generally what Democrats do for their nominee.
But after helping to get him elected the SECOND time and having to realize that very little changed, a certain reality can't be denied. I don't want to feel as I do. I wasn't crazy about LBJ, but when he went to Congress with what he wanted done, they knew he meant business! I'm sure many had different views from time to time, but he let them know who was boss. And he DID make mistakes of his own, but I don't think many denied that HE had the Bully Pulpit!
I know I feel he should have taken the bull by the horns and let them know he wasn't going to take their CRAP by trying to compromise! Especially when it was evident that they never intended to compromise no matter what.
Guess I was harsh rather than what my intent was. I lost my blinders some where along the line.
... but Issa isn't going to crash. I think his fortune has doubled since he came to Congress. You do know he's the richest Congressman (that we know of)? Last I heard, a couple weeks ago, was that he's worth over $450 million now. That's almost a half a billion. Congress should do something about this, though. He'll probably get a slap on the hand. How can Californians justify this man's presence in Congress? That's the one I will never understand.
What a thug, with a rap sheet as long as a roll of toilet paper. 
[url=http://www.freesmileys.org/smileys.php][img]
[/img][/url]
"Please, God, bring this scoundrel to justice. Amen." 
*Joe Lieberman won't let him
*He has to be President of ALL the people
*9th dimensional chess
*need to save the dry powder (to protect Clapper!)
*you can't quickly turn a ship at sea
*give him time...its only been 5-1/2 years
*if he did that,..... then we get Sarah Palin
*Rush Limbaugh would say bad things
*he has a bigger, bolder plan... way beyond our ability to comprehend
*he doesn't have a Magic Wand
*you weren't listening during the campaign
*he wants to look like the adult
*he is a unifier, not a divider
*who better to run the IRS than a crook?
...there are more good reasons, but you get the point.
who woulda' ever thunk it? 
