Levin: Republican IRS Analysis Noteworthy for its Missing Information

Statement

Ways and Means Committee Ranking Member Sander Levin (D-MI) today made the following statement after Ways and Means Republicans produced an analysis of an unspecified and unverified subset of tax-exemption applications to which only they have access:

"The Republican analysis is noteworthy for what it fails to acknowledge and what it fails to disclose. The IRS Inspector General concluded that there was no evidence of political motivation. However, his failure to disclose that liberal organizations also were subject to the same treatment and singled out was used by Republicans to try to tie the IRS mismanagement to the White House. First, Republicans claimed that only conservative groups were singled out and accused the White House of operating an enemies list. Now Republicans are arguing that conservative groups received more scrutiny than liberal groups.

"The Republican analysis makes no mention of the time period of applications reviewed, no mention of whether they were the same applications reviewed by TIGTA in connection with the audit, and no mention of the fact that there are terms that reflect liberal organizations other than "progressive.' What's more, it doesn't disclose the overall number of conservative groups -- compared with liberal groups -- who applied for tax-exempt status. This is a recurring problem in this investigation -- the release of incomplete information. Indeed, that is exactly what led to fundamental flaws in the TIGTA report.

"The overwhelming fact remains that Republicans will do everything they can to deflect attention from their inability to do almost anything -- a record that has earned them historically low ratings from the American public."

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