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Friday, August 1, 2014

The IRS Scandal, Day 449

IRS Logo 2New York Observer:  Did The White House Know About the IRS Emails? The IRS, the President, and his No. 1 Muse: Kathryn Ruemmler, by Sidney Powell:

The president’s longest serving White House counsel, Kathryn Ruemmler, was, until her sudden departure for Latham & Watkins, “a regular presence in the Situation Room and the Oval Office, making legal judgments and helping coach other senior officials on how to discuss them publicly,” according to the Washington Post. Our first article, “All The President’s Muses,” described Ms. Reummler’s outsized role in the aftermath of the Benghazi tragedy. It’s undisputed she starred in the president’s expansive use of executive powers, increased secrecy and recent Supreme Court reversals.

With the near daily revelations from the IRS, the question becomes, what exactly might Ms. Ruemmler know?

The Inspector General of the Treasury confirmed that the IRS targeted the president’s political opposition with audits, harassment and denials of tax-exempt status. Patrick Howley reported from congressional hearings that even more IRS computers surrounding Lois Lerner and the White House had crashed. Now the IRS is claiming that the number is greater than seven (the prior count) but fewer than 20. There may be emails on back-up devices, but the IRS still claims it isn’t sure.

The burning question is: have they looked in the White House? ...

Ms. Ruemmler’s recent midnight departure from the White House left her actions largely unscrutinized. Yet, she was squarely in the middle of the IRS controversy from the very beginning. As she told the Wall Street Journal, “The White House really sees everything, and you touch everything.” ...

As White House counsel, Ms. Ruemmler led the president in all federal appointments. Her fingerprints are all over the president’s attempt to appoint Mary Smith, a colleague from Ms. Ruemmler’s days in President Clinton’s Counsel’s office, to head the powerful Tax Division of the Department of Justice. Senator Grassley blocked that confirmation, leaving the White House “very upset.” In response, Lois Lerner suggested auditing Senator Grassley.

Not long ago, the president said he knew nothing about the IRS target-hunting. Roger Aronoff reported that both the White House Chief of Staff and White House Counsel Ms. Ruemmler knew about the targeting of conservative groups at least a month before (the now infamous) Ms. Lerner “planted a question” regarding the IRS’ abusive actions. “President Obama later claimed on national television that in terms of the IRS scandal, there wasn’t a ‘smidgeon of corruption’ in his administration, and blamed the whole episode on ‘bone-headed decisions’ of bureaucrats.”

Ms. Ruemmler claimed she did not tell the president—prompting even some Democrats, including Lanny Davis, a prominent Democratic crisis manager, to call for her resignation more than a year ago. Yet, she remained safely in place.

“Either Ruemmler was incredibly incompetent or the White House is lying about when Obama knew of the scandal,” writes Ed Morrissey at Hot Air. “We got a big hint . . . when Obama changed the context of a question about his awareness of the scandal to his awareness of the IG report, which is pointedly not the same thing.” ...

In an incredible stroke of luck, the emails on multiple computers that might reveal IRS agents’ communications with the White House were precisely the ones that mysteriously disappeared.

That lucky streak continued when by mere happenstance Ms. Ruemmler left the White House shortly before IRS Commissioner Koskinen was forced to admit that thousands of emails between Ms. Lerner, the White House and others were “missing.” ...

These IRS emails are today’s White House Watergate tapes. Who and how many people in the White House were recipients or senders? Surely, their computers haven’t crashed, too. How could 155 visits by a key IRS agent be missed by White House Counsel—the president’s fiercest protector?

So what did Ms. Ruemmler know and when did she know it?

https://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2014/08/the-irs-sc.html

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