DECEMBER 09, 2014
(Washington,
DC) – Judicial Watch today
released internal Department of Justice (DOJ) documents
revealing that former IRS official Lois Lerner had been in contact with DOJ
officials about the possible criminal prosecution of tax-exempt entities two
full years before what the IRS conceded was its “absolutely
inappropriate” 2012 targeting of the organizations. According to the newly
obtained documents, Lerner met with top Obama DOJ Election Crimes Branch
officials as early as October 2010.
The new documents
were obtained through a Judicial Watch Freedom of Information Act (FOIA)
lawsuit filed against the DOJ on July 21, 2014 (Judicial
Watch v. Department of Justice (No. 14-cv-01239)), after the agency
failed to respond to an April 21, 2014, FOIA request seeking:
Any and all records
concerning meetings and/or communications between the Department of Justice
Criminal Division Public Integrity Section and the Internal Revenue Service Tax
Exempt and Government Entities Division, the White House, Members of Congress
and/or congressional staff, and any non-government entity, regarding 501(c)(4)
or other tax-exempt organizations.
As result of a court
order, the DOJ last month produced only two pages of heavily redacted
emails (832 pages were withheld in entirety) that show the Obama Justice
Department initiated an October 8, 2010, meeting between the IRS and top
criminal prosecutors at the DOJ Public Integrity Section and Election Crimes
Division “concerning 501(c)(4) issues.” On September 29, 2010, a DOJ official (whose
name is blacked out) emailed a staff assistant at the IRS (whose name is also
redacted):
As we discussed this
afternoon, we would like to invite Ms. Ingram [apparent reference to Sarah Hall
Ingram former commissioner, IRS Tax Exempt and Government Entities] to meet
with us concerning 501(c)(4) issues, and propose next
Friday at 10:00 a.m. We are located in the Bond Building, 12th Floor, New York
Avenue, NW, Thank you for your assistance.
The document shows
that the unknown DOJ official setting up the meeting is with the Election
Crimes Division of the Public Integrity Section of the DOJ’s Criminal Division.
(Judicial Watch believes the redacted name of the DOJ official is Richard Pilger, Director of the Election Crimes Division.) The DOJ email setting up the IRS meeting is cc’d to the DOJ’s Public Integrity Section Chief, Jack
Smith, and Principal Deputy Chief Raymond Hulser. The documents show that Ingram was not
available but arranged for her deputy, Lois Lerner, then-Director of the IRS
Exempt Organizations branch, to meet with the DOJ senior officials.
On September 30, 2010, the Election Crimes
prosecutor emails Lerner:
Hi Lois - It’s been
a long time, and you might not remember me, I’ve taken on [REDACTED] duties. I’m looking forward to meeting you, Can we
chat in advance? I’m a [REDACTED]
Lerner responded on October 2, 2010:
Sure-that’s a good
Idea [sic]. I have a meeting out of the office Monday
morning, but will try you when I get back sometime early afternoon. You can try me at 202 283-8848.
The Justice
Department has withheld in full at least 832 additional pages of documents,
citing various “taxpayer privacy,” “deliberative privilege,” and other
exemptions to keep the records secret.
Earlier this year,
on April 16, 2014, Judicial Watch forced the IRS to release documents
revealing that Lerner communicated with the DOJ in May of 2013 about whether it
was possible to criminally prosecute targeted tax-exempt entities. The documents were obtained because of a court
order in an October 2013 Judicial Watch FOIA lawsuit
filed against the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).
Those documents
contained an email exchange between Lerner and Nikole
C. Flax, then-Chief of Staff to then-Acting IRS Commissioner Steven T. Miller
discussing plans to work with the DOJ to prosecute nonprofit groups that “lied”
(Lerner’s quotation marks) about political activities. The exchange included an
May 8,
2013, email by Lerner:
I got a call today
from Richard Pilger Director Elections Crimes Branch
at DOJ … He wanted to know who at IRS the DOJ folk s [sic] could talk to about Sen. Whitehouse idea at the hearing that
DOJ could piece together false statement cases about applicants who “lied” on
their 1024s – saying they weren’t planning on doing political activity, and
then turning around and making large visible political expenditures. DOJ is feeling like it needs to respond, but
want to talk to the right folks at IRS to see whether there are impediments
from our side and what, if any damage this might do to IRS programs. I told him that sounded like we might need
several folks from IRS…
Democratic Rhode
Island Senator Sheldon Whitehouse held
a hearing on April 9, 2013, during which, “in questioning the witnesses
from DOJ and IRS, Whitehouse asked why they have not prosecuted 501(c)(4) groups that have seemingly made false statements about
their political activities
The House
Oversight Committee followed up on these Judicial Watch disclosures with
hearings and interviews of Pilger and his boss, DOJ
Public Integrity Chief Jack Smith. Besides
confirming the DOJ’s 2013 communications with Lerner, Pilger admitted to the Committee that DOJ officials met
with Lerner in October 2010. (Department
of Justice Public Integrity Section statistics
show indictments and convictions of federal officials for public corruptions
have dropped significantly under the Obama administration.)
According to congressional
investigators, on October 5, another Lerner email shows the IRS had sent
the FBI and DOJ a “1.1 million page database of information from 501(c)(4) tax exempt organizations” that contained confidential
taxpayer information. (In October 2010,
the IRS also stopped processing “potential
political cases”).
In her May 2013 answer to a planted
question, in which she admitted to the “absolutely incorrect, insensitive,
and inappropriate” targeting of Tea Party and conservative groups, Lerner
suggested the IRS targeting occurred due to an “uptick” in 501(c)(4)
applications to the IRS, but there had been a decrease
in such applications in 2010.
“These new
documents dramatically show how the Justice Department is up to its neck in the
IRS scandal and can’t be trusted to investigate crimes associated with the IRS
abuses that targeted Obama’s critics. And it is of particular concern that the DOJ’s
Public Integrity Section, which would ordinarily investigate the IRS abuses, is
now implicated in the IRS crimes. No
wonder the Department of Justice under Eric Holder has done no
serious investigation of the Obama IRS scandal,” said Judicial Watch President
Tom Fitton. “It
is shameful how Establishment Washington has let slide by Obama’s abuse of the
IRS and the Justice Department. Only as
a result of Judicial Watch’s independent investigations did the American people
learn
about the IRS-DOJ prosecution discussions of Obama’s political enemies and how
the IRS sent, in violation of law, confidential
taxpayer information to the FBI and DOJ in 2010. Richard Nixon was impeached for less.”