WASHINGTON - Ways and Means Committee Ranking Member Sander Levin (D-MI) issued the following statement today regarding the proposed guidance for tax-exempt social welfare organizations being issued today by the Treasury Department and the IRS:
“The work of 501 (c) (4) organizations is vital in communities across the country and it is important that there be clear guidelines between promoting social welfare and engaging in political activity for organizations seeking this tax exemption. As we plainly saw in the investigations into the failings within the IRS tax-exempt division, the lack of clear guidance in defining and measuring political activities under current law led to mismanagement and delays in the processing of exemption applications from progressive and conservative organizations. The proposal for a ‘candidate-related political activity’ is a reasonable starting place, but the details will be important, for example in an area as critical as voter registration drives.
“This is a good first step to engage the public and one clearly that must be taken so that we remove the ambiguity from the current system. This proposal is part of an overall effort that has been underway for months at the IRS to ensure that those mistakes - which included gross mismanagement of the tax-exempt division - are not repeated. After dozens of interviews and the review of hundreds of thousands of pages of documents, there is absolutely no evidence of any political motivation or outside involvement, contrary to what Republicans have alleged from the beginning."
