WASHINGTON, DC - Ways and Means Committee Ranking Member Sander Levin (D-MI) today issued the following statement after the U.S. Department of Justice concluded its investigation into the Internal Revenue Service’s (IRS) handling of tax-exempt organization applications under Lois Lerner:
“The Justice Department’s decision today confirms what we know based on the initial TIGTA report and our investigation - that there was no political bias, no corrupt motives, and no criminal activity whatsoever in the processing of applications by the agency’s tax-exempt division. As the Assistant Attorney General stated, ‘Our investigation uncovered substantial evidence of mismanagement, poor judgment…But poor management is not a crime. We found no evidence that any IRS official acted based on political, discriminatory, corrupt, or other inappropriate motives that would support a criminal prosecution.’ It’s deeply disappointing that Chairman Ryan in his statement attacks the Administration, politicizing issues like we’ve seen with the Benghazi investigation.
“I was one of the first Members of Congress to call for Ms. Lerner’s resignation in 2013 in response to her mismanagement and poor judgement. Since May of 2013, the IRS has spent $20 million and provided to Congress more than one million pages of documents related to this investigation."
Highlights of the letter:
* The DOJ investigation uncovered substantial evidence of mismanagement and poor judgment, but no evidence of political bias or discrimination.
* The DOJ investigation uncovered no evidence of IRS officials obstructing justice.
* No employees were granted immunity from prosecution as part of the investigation.
* DOJ found that IRS employees targeted applications because of their desire to treat applications consistently and to avoid making incorrect decisions.
* DOJ found that IRS has used inept labels in organizing their review of applications before-specifically noting the use of coordinating keywords such as “progressive" and “ACORN." DOJ notes that this historical practice “creates a substantial barrier to establishing criminal intent, and bolsters the conclusion that IRS employees did not believe that coordinating for review applications using words like “Tea Party" could potentially violate the Constitution or Tax Code, or that this method of coordinating applications for review was discriminatory or otherwise inappropriate."
* DOJ focused on Ms. Lerner given several of her personal emails that criticized conservatives, but found that her personal views did not influence official actions.
