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Thursday, October 27, 2016

The IRS Scandal, Day 1267: Court Orders IRS to Give Account For Targeting Conservatives

IRS Logo 2One News Now, IRS to Give Account for Targeting Conservatives:

A Christian legal group recently scored a legal victory against the IRS, which was ordered to issue outstanding determinations and answer for its political targeting of conservative groups and citizens to whom it unjustly denied tax exemptions for years. ...

The American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) was pleased to announce last week its latest victory against the agency many Americans love to hate. “Three years after we filed a lawsuit on their behalf – and for some, nearly seven years after they submitted their applications for tax-exempt status – the grassroots conservative groups that were targeted by the IRS for their political views are finally receiving some of the relief to which they have long been entitled – determinations on those applications.”

After the IRS refused to change its unlawful discriminatory dealings with conservatives by continuing its abuse of the system through punishing those not embracing the administration’s Leftist politics, the lawsuit filed against it pressed forward in the courts.

“In early August, the federal appellate court for the District of Columbia Circuit held that the plaintiffs who filed suit in Linchpins of Liberty, et al. v. United States, et al. in 2013 had set forth allegations sufficient to obtain actual evidence about the IRS’s targeting of conservative tax-exempt applicants based on their names and political positions,” the ACLJ reported. “The D.C. Circuit thus reversed the decision of the district court (which had previously dismissed the claims on the grounds that the IRS had apparently ceased the targeting conduct) and sent the case back to the lower court, explaining that the IRS had failed to demonstrate that either the targeting scheme, or its effects on plaintiffs, had actually ended.”

ACLJ Chief Counsel Jay Sekulow maintains that the court was no longer willing to allow the IRS to drag its feet – ordering it provide information about its alleged shady dealings targeting conservative groups over the years. “[Earlier this month], District Judge Reggie B. Walton held a status conference to resume the lower court proceedings in the case,” Sekulow announced. “While the IRS’s attorney, once again, took the position that most of the claims are moot because most of the plaintiff organizations have received determinations, the court picked up where the D.C. Circuit left off, and ordered that the IRS cease delaying determinations on any outstanding tax-exempt applications of Tea Party groups and other grassroots organizations. He gave the IRS 30 days to comply.”

https://taxprof.typepad.com/taxprof_blog/2016/10/the-irs-scandal-day-1267-court-orders-irs-to-give-account-for-targeting-conservatives.html

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