Schock: Ways and Means Committee on Its 'Last Attempt... to Play Nice' with IRS

Rep. Aaron Schock (R-Ill.) said the House Ways and Means Committee’s threat to subpoena the IRS emails of Lois Lerner and other IRS documents “is basically the last attempt by our Chairman Dave Camp to play nice.”

“It’s our last attempt to say, look, here are six letters that we have sent you since may of last year. Many of them cosigned by the leading Democrat on the committee, Sander Levin, asking for repeated attempts for information that we need to conclude our investigation to come to some determination, as to who is responsible within the administration, within the IRS for this illegal targeting. And all of those six, but one, have been ignored,” Schock said on Fox.

“Not even answered. Five of the six letters, and anybody, again, Democrat or Republican in America, should be outraged.”

Schock said many on the committee have been urging Camp, the only one who can issue the subpoena, to do so.

“Basically, this is the last straw and everybody is getting frustrated at the lack of cooperation. Our committee has jurisdiction,” he said.

The congressman noted that the revolving door of four acting or permanent IRS commissioners in the past year was hampering the investigation.

“Every one of them, once they get appointed they come in and the first thing they say is Chairman Camp, members of the committee, I’m the new acting commissioner, and I’m here to comply,” Schock said.

“Simple things like did the IRS notify the treasury of the targeting? Did the IRS notify the White House of the targeting? Zippo. Cricket. No response.”

Yesterday, Camp sent IRS Commissioner John Koskinen a letter requesting again all documents related to the IRS targeting of conservative groups.

“At a recent Subcommittee on Oversight hearing on January 28, 2014, you promised to work with the Committee to fulfill this months-long request,” the chairman wrote. “However, we have yet to receive any additional Lerner documents. If the IRS does not take immediate steps to provide the Committee with documents responsive to this request, I will consider using compulsory process to compel them.”

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