Congress held another hearing today on the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) scandal. The IRS has revealed it subjected Tea Party and other conservative groups seeking non-profit status to extra scrutiny from 2010 to 2012.
Idaho Senator Mike Crapo sat in on two hearings yesterday where the matter was discussed. He says in 2010 the IRS had created a BOLO or 'Be On the Lookout' list, instructing Internal Revenue agents to identify Tea Party case files.
He says the abuse by the IRS is very serious.
“Perhaps more than any other agency of the federal government," Crapo say, "the Internal Revenue Service has the ability to be the prosecutor, judge, the jury and the executioner in terms of people’s livelihoods and their future.”
Crapo says those being questioned are “stonewalling,” when it comes to explanations of how this happened. “Which prompted me to raise the question if they actually expect Americans to believe this policy just came together out of thin air and sort of settled on the IRS as a policy without any kind of direction from leadership in the Administration,” the senator says.
Today the woman who heads the office in charge of granting tax exempt status appeared in front of Congress. She said she's done nothing wrong, broke no laws and has provided no false information to lawmakers. She then invoked her Fifth Amendment right and answered no questions.
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