How the IRS spun out of control

Little guidance from Washington and a flood of

new nonprofits left the Cincinnati office overwhelmed.
 
By Joseph Tanfani, Matea Gold and Melanie Mason

 May 18, 2013|

    Ousted IRS acting Commissioner Steven Miller knew trouble was brewing as early as March 2012. Election season was well underway when tea party groups started to complain of IRS harassment over their requests for tax-exempt status.


WASHINGTON — Steven Miller, the top enforcement official at the Internal Revenue Service, thought he might have trouble on his hands.

Election season was well underway in March 2012 when tea party organizations started to complain angrily of IRS harassment over their requests for tax-exempt status. The media was looking into it. Congress had picked up the scent.
Miller dispatched an advisor to Cincinnati, where a field office handles applications from nonprofits, to figure out what was up. What he learned would blow up into a crisis that would damage the agency's reputation and lead to his ouster last week.

With little oversight from Washington, agents in Ohio had been singling out some conservative groups for extra scrutiny, seeking to make sure they were not too heavily involved in politics to qualify as tax-exempt.

Worse yet, the agents had sent the organizations letters with numerous intrusive questions, including the groups' positions on political issues and the names of their donors.

Miller failed to tell Congress what he knew for more than a year, despite repeated queries from House committees. On Friday, at times chagrined and combative as he spoke to House members, Miller called the IRS' focus on conservative groups "obnoxious" and described what happened as "horrible customer service."

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