Found Out from IRS about Church Running Ads Attacking "Libruls"

[UTUSN]

This church has been running radio ads claiming that Libruls are waging war on religion, want to do away with religion, are intolerant of religion, blah blah.

The IRS snitch line people I talked to didn't know what the law was, said all they do is to take the report and pass it on for somebody else to decide whether to proceed with an investigation or not. I talked to about half a dozen IRS phone staff, asking them whether the bottom line was whether the church was specifically endorsing a candidate or a party or just spewing in general.

Today somebody in the Tax Exempt division finally gave an unmistakeable answer, although she was mealy mouthed and bureaucratic. She at least looked at the church's website, which does NOT name candidates or parties either. She kept repeating that "We at the IRS canNOT tell a church what to say or not say." I said I understand, that the bottom line is that this outfit can just go on irritating the Hades out of me. She thought that was funny.

She also informed me that it is possible that the church is not PAYING for the ads, that the radio station owner might be donating the airtime to them. That just irritated me more: :mad:

[getmeouttahere]

1. I know it's aggravating, UTUSN, but....

chill out a little, that's about a 9 on the tension scale.

Consider this. The country is going down the tubes because of BushCo's policies. If people want to listen to these morons whine about a non-existent war on religion, fine, the country will go that much faster down the toilet. But liberals have to ignore this crap and focus on the core issues that are making things so difficult for almost everyone, and when the rest of the country finally realizes that something needs to be done, the Democrats/liberals will be there with the ideas and policies needed to rescue them.

[TheDebbieDee]

2. The IRS cannot tell a church what to say or not to say......

But the IRS can and should revoke the Tax-exempt status of a politically active church.

The next time you complain about a church to the IRS, maybe you should try to phrase it in terms of whether or not the organization should be able to keep its tax-exempt status!

[UTUSN]

3. I Did

That framing (can't-tell-them-what-to-say) was HER weaseling-out, not mine. As I said.

[TheDebbieDee]

5. Sorry, I should have read your post more carefully.......

before I put in my 2 cents!

[Coyote_Bandit]

4. Not for profit corporations

are prohibited from endorsing candidates. They are not prohibited from discussing or advocating positions on issues.

See one IRS publication on the issue here:
http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=122887,00.html