Reuters: Politics: New IRS chief tells Congress he will clean up U.S. tax agency

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New IRS chief tells Congress he will clean up U.S. tax agency Jun 3rd 2013, 19:30 A woman walks out of an Internal Revenue Service office in New York April 18, 2011. Credit: Reuters/Lucas Jackson By Kim Dixon and John Whitesides WASHINGTON | Mon Jun 3, 2013 3:30pm EDT WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The new chief of the Internal Revenue Service told Congress on Monday the tax-collecting agency would fully investigate and repair the problems that led to the inappropriate targeting of conservative groups for extra scrutiny. Acting IRS Commissioner Danny Werfel, appearing before Congress for the first time since moving into the top job two weeks ago, said the agency would make a public accounting of the practices that have led to multiple investigations and a political firestorm. Werfel said a new team of agency leaders would focus on clearing the backlog of applications for tax-exempt status from political groups, concentrating on those that are more than 120 days old. He also said he was reviewing whether "additional personnel actions" were required to make sure the individuals involved in the practice were held accountable. "We owe it to the American public to use this moment as an opportunity to take a hard look internally at the IRS and see where other deficiencies or risks may exist, and take action to address them," Werfel told a sub-panel of the House of Representatives Appropriations Committee. The IRS has been at the center of a political brawl over the practice after the head of the tax-exempt unit, Lois Lerner, apologized publicly on May 10 for the extra scrutiny given to applications for tax-exempt status by conservative political groups. A report four days later by Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration J. Russell George found ineffective management and bureaucratic confusion contributed to the inappropriate targeting of conservative groups. Irate Republicans have accused President Barack Obama's administration of covering up responsibility for the practice but so far have not identified who was responsible for the extra scrutiny for conservative groups. Several congressional committees and the Justice Department are looking into the practice, which led to the ouster of the agency's top executive and sparked a political backlash that has endangered Obama's second-term legislative agenda. The House hearing on Monday, the fourth by a congressional panel, is the first of three scheduled for this week. On Tuesday, the House Ways and Means Committee will hear from Tea Party groups targeted in the program, and on Thursday the House Government and Oversight Committee will examine IRS spending on conferences. Republican Darrell Issa, chairman of the Government and Oversight panel, released partial transcripts on Sunday from interviews with two Cincinnati, Ohio-based IRS employees who suggested supervisors in Washington played a role in the program to target conservative groups. One employee answered "I believe so" when asked whether the additional scrutiny of conservative groups came from Washington, and a more senior IRS worker said, "I was taking all my direction" from Washington on the practice. "This is a problem that was coordinated in all likelihood right out of Washington headquarters and we're getting to proving it," Issa said on CNN on Sunday. He called White House spokesman Jay Carney a "paid liar." The committee, however, did not release the full transcripts from the employee interviews and did not identify anyone in Washington involved in the process, drawing the ire of Democrats who said Issa was overstating his findings. During his briefing on Monday, Carney refused to be drawn into a crossfire with Issa. "I am not interested in a back and forth with the chairman," Carney said, adding the administration would continue to cooperate investigators looking into the controversy. Lerner, who made the practice public, declined to testify when called before Issa's committee two weeks ago and has been suspended from her job. Former IRS Commissioner Doug Shulman and former acting IRS Commissioner Steven Miller, whom Werfel replaced, testified they were not aware of what was going on until after the practice had been stopped. (Editing by David Lindsey and Doina Chiacu) Link this Share this Digg this Email Reprints

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