In a Tuesday press release and in his opening statement today, Chairman Camp stated flatly that emails for former IRS Chief of Staff Nicole Flax are missing. He based that rush to judgment on preliminary information that IRS IT professionals informed Committee staff on Monday about computer crashes at the IRS. It turns out, as Commissioner Koskinen stated today, there is no indication that a single Nicole Flax e-mail has been lost.
What Republicans Allege:
Chairman Camp on Tuesday: We now know documents from other central figures, like Nicole Flax, are missing.
Chairman Camp today: We are missing the emails of seven IRS officials and during periods critical to this investigation.
What We Actually Know:
Commissioner Koskinen today: There's been a question as to why I didn't advise Congress earlier and my experience has been than we do better to have a rational discussion when you know all the facts. It's shown by the fact that on Monday we were advised Monday morning that there were preliminary indications that there were difficulties with a handful of custodians. That information was passed onto the staff of this committee on Monday afternoon. Immediately thereafter rather than asking us for additional information a press release went out from this committee identifying Nicole Flax as a particularly interesting person to this committee and stating that Nicole Flax’s e-mails have been lost. Had the committee waited to issue that release until we knew further information which were continuing to provide, they would have discovered that Nicole Flax had two computers. Her office computer which she used during the day and she had a travel computer, a portable. It was the portable computer that crashed. It ran on the same e-mail system as her office system. So it turns out there is no indication that a single Nicole Flax e-mail has been lost, notwithstanding the press release and statements out of this committee. Those press releases with regard to Nicole Flax were inaccurate and misleading and it demonstrates why we'll provide this committee a full report about the custodian review when it is completed. And we are not going to dribble out the information and have it played out in the press.
