Judicial Watch reports that it has obtained email exchanges between disgraced IRS official Lois Lerner and enforcement attorneys at the Federal Election Commission. Lerner worked at the FEC before moving over to the IRS, and at the FEC developed a reputation for wielding her power against a conservative candidate and Christian-based political groups.
According to the email chain that Judicial Watch has unearthed via FOIA requests, Lerner continued that behavior at the IRS.
The revealing email chain obtained by Judicial Watch begins with a February 3, 2009, email from a redacted FEC attorney asking Lerner if the IRS had issued an exemption letter for American Future Fund (AFF). The writer of the letter notes, “When we spoke last July, you told us that the American Future Fund had not received an exemption letter from the IRS.” In the same email, the FEC attorney asked Lerner if she could also advise him if the IRS had granted an exemption letter to American Issues Project (AIP) as well as to AIP’s predecessor organizations, Citizens for the Republic (CFTR) and Avenger, Inc. (AIP).
In her response sent ten minutes later from her irs.gov email address, Lerner indicated that she would require her staff to cooperate fully, saying, “I have sent your email out to some of my staff. Will get back to you as soon as I have heard from them.”
The bulk of the records obtained by Judicial Watch consist of extensive materials from the IRS’ files sent from Lerner to the FEC containing detailed, confidential information about the organizations. These include annual tax returns (Forms 990) and request for exempt recognition forms (Form 1024), Articles of Organization and other corporate documents, and correspondence between the nonprofit organizations and the IRS. Under Section 6013 of the Internal Revenue Code, it is a felony for an IRS official to disclose either “return information” or “taxpayer return information,” even to another government agency.
Initial news reports, when word of some of these IRS-FEC emails first surfaced in August 2013, raised a variety of legal issues. One was the fact that Lerner was supplying confidential information concerning the tax exempt application status of conservative organizations. Another was the fact that the inquiries regarding AFF made by the FEC attorneys in February 2009 to Lerner occurred before the FEC commissioners had voted on whether to investigate AFF (the FEC later voted not to investigate AFF). A third was the appearance of collusion between government agencies with an apparently anti-conservative bias. The new in-depth emails obtained by Judicial Watch seem to confirm that the possible collusion between the IRS and the FEC may have been far more extensive than first indicated, particularly in view of allegations that, prior to joining the IRS, Lerner’s tenure as head of the Enforcement Office at the Federal Election Commission (FEC) also was marked by what appeared to be politically motivated harassment of conservative groups.
“These extensive emails and other materials provide a disturbing window into the activities of two out-of-control federal agencies: the IRS and FEC,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “And there is the very real question as to whether these documents evidence a crime.”
The information Lerner disclosed was confidential, and disclosing it outside her agency is a felony. Lerner’s former office — she has retired from the IRS — is at the center of the agency’s abuse scandal. When Lerner first disclosed the abuse of Tea Party, conservative, Christian and Jewish groups, she blamed it on “rogue” employees at the IRS office in Cincinnati. That excuse quickly broke down as the scandal made its way straight to Washington. Lerner herself pled the Fifth Amendment and refused to testify about her role in the scandal under oath.
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