{"id":6957,"date":"2014-04-11T04:32:13","date_gmt":"2014-04-11T08:32:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ncdata.wpengine.com\/?p=6957"},"modified":"2017-09-20T20:45:40","modified_gmt":"2017-09-21T00:45:40","slug":"a-bad-week-for-lois-lerner-but-a-good-week-for-finding-the-truth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nationalcenter.org\/ncppr\/2014\/04\/11\/a-bad-week-for-lois-lerner-but-a-good-week-for-finding-the-truth\/","title":{"rendered":"A Bad Week for Lois Lerner, But a Good Week for Finding the Truth"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_6958\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-6958\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-6958\" src=\"https:\/\/nationalcenter.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/02\/stormcapitol-300x239.jpg\" alt=\"Dark sky over the United States Capitol building in Washington DC.\" width=\"300\" height=\"239\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-6958\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Dark sky over the United States Capitol building in Washington DC.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>This was a bad week for Lois Lerner, but nothing that she apparently couldn\u2019t have prevented.\u00a0 It\u2019s her mess.<\/p>\n<p>The former head of the Internal Revenue Service\u2019s division that oversees tax-exempt organizations incurred the wrath of two different congressional committees this week for her part in the alleged malicious targeting of conservative organizations seeking nonprofit status.<\/p>\n<p>Lerner previously professed her innocence in the matter in a statement before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, but then immediately invoked her 5<sup>th<\/sup> Amendment protection against testifying before the committee.\u00a0 This conflicted episode in particular, as well as the mounting evidence that only conservative applicants were hounded and delayed by the IRS during their application processes, has drawn the ire of lawmakers who are seeking answers.<\/p>\n<p>So, on Wednesday, the House Ways and Means Committee <a href=\"http:\/\/washingtonexaminer.com\/ways-and-means-asks-justice-department-to-consider-criminal-charges-against-former-irs-official-lois-lerner\/article\/2546996#\">voted<\/a> to formally request that the U.S. Department of Justice consider a criminal prosecution of Lerner for the unfair treatment of conservative applicants, misleading congressional investigators and illegally releasing private information from taxpayer records.\u00a0 An official statement from the Committee stated that \u201cLerner used her position to improperly influence agency action against only conservative organizations, denying these groups due process and equal protection rights under the law.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Then, on Thursday, the Committee on House Oversight and Government Reform <a href=\"http:\/\/www3.blogs.rollcall.com\/218\/house-committee-votes-to-hold-lois-lerner-in-contempt\/?dcz=\">voted<\/a> to hold Lerner in contempt for her refusal to testify before the Committee.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/nationalcenter.org\/P21Index.html\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-6959 alignright\" src=\"https:\/\/nationalcenter.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/02\/P21HoraceCooper-6.jpg\" alt=\"P21HoraceCooper\" width=\"102\" height=\"122\" \/>Project 21<\/a> co-chairman <a href=\"https:\/\/nationalcenter.org\/bios\/P21Speakers_Cooper.html\">Horace Cooper<\/a>, a former staff member of the House leadership, said that Lerner has only herself to blame and that the American people are owed answers to the lingering questions about the probably political targeting of certain Americans for the political beliefs.\u00a0 Horace said:<\/p>\n<p>This past week, both the Committee on Ways and Means and the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform of the U.S. House of Representatives signaled that the Internal Revenue Service is not the law unto itself and that every federal employee \u2014 including Lois Lerner \u2014 must be accountable to the American people.<\/p>\n<p>The charges involved here are serious.\u00a0 Every American is subject to the dictates of the IRS, and they expect that those interactions will be neutral and dispassionate.\u00a0 Unfortunately the evidence indicates that Lerner\u2019s actions were anything but neutral.<\/p>\n<p>It is axiomatic that the IRS shouldn\u2019t target Americans because of their beliefs or their political activities.<\/p>\n<p>Our nation was founded on the principle that citizens are free to criticize or support the government without reprisal. \u00a0By threatening this principle, it appears that Lerner violated the law.<\/p>\n<p>Now, it is important for Lerner to face the consequences of her alleged actions and to tell the American people about the other parties potentially involved in such crimes.<\/p>\n<p>photo credit: iStockPhoto<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This was a bad week for Lois Lerner, but nothing that she apparently couldn\u2019t have prevented.\u00a0 It\u2019s her mess. The former head of the Internal Revenue Service\u2019s division that oversees tax-exempt organizations incurred the wrath of two different congressional committees this week for her part&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,74,36],"tags":[77],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>A Bad Week for Lois Lerner, But a Good Week for Finding the Truth - The National Center<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/nationalcenter.org\/ncppr\/2014\/04\/11\/a-bad-week-for-lois-lerner-but-a-good-week-for-finding-the-truth\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"David Almasi\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationalcenter.org\/ncppr\/2014\/04\/11\/a-bad-week-for-lois-lerner-but-a-good-week-for-finding-the-truth\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationalcenter.org\/ncppr\/2014\/04\/11\/a-bad-week-for-lois-lerner-but-a-good-week-for-finding-the-truth\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"David Almasi\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationalcenter.org\/#\/schema\/person\/986101645c65e8d001dc8de54beb396d\"},\"headline\":\"A Bad Week for Lois Lerner, But a Good Week for Finding the Truth\",\"datePublished\":\"2014-04-11T08:32:13+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2017-09-21T00:45:40+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationalcenter.org\/ncppr\/2014\/04\/11\/a-bad-week-for-lois-lerner-but-a-good-week-for-finding-the-truth\/\"},\"wordCount\":478,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationalcenter.org\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationalcenter.org\/ncppr\/2014\/04\/11\/a-bad-week-for-lois-lerner-but-a-good-week-for-finding-the-truth\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/nationalcenter.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/02\/stormcapitol-300x239.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"ConservativeBlog.org\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Articles\",\"Blog\",\"Project 21\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/nationalcenter.org\/ncppr\/2014\/04\/11\/a-bad-week-for-lois-lerner-but-a-good-week-for-finding-the-truth\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/nationalcenter.org\/ncppr\/2014\/04\/11\/a-bad-week-for-lois-lerner-but-a-good-week-for-finding-the-truth\/\",\"name\":\"A Bad Week for Lois Lerner, But a Good Week for Finding the Truth - 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