What was the IRS’s “Secret Research Project”?

irs-leadership

Judicial Watch’s latest release of IRS discussions gives us a peek into why so many IRS emails are disappearing.

A subsequent IRS email thread on June 27, 2012, revealed that inappropriately obtained donor lists were being used for a “secret research project” and that a top official wanted then-Acting IRS Commissioner Steve Miller to decide how to handle the issue.  The email exchange, with the Subject line “donor names,” included the following:

June 27, 2012: 8:59 AM — David L. Fish, IRS acting director of Exempt Organizations Rulings and Agreements, to Holly Paz:

Joseph Urban [IRS Technical Advisor, Tax Exempt and Government Entities] had actually started a secret research project on whether we could, consistent with 6104, argue that [REDACTED] Joe was quite agitated yesterday when I told him what we were doing. (He was involved when the initial question was raised, but we didn’t continue reading him in). At one point he started saying that this was a decision for Steve Miller–I told him we were already doing it, and that I didn’t know whether Lois had already talked to Nikole [former IRS Chief of Staff to IRS Commissioner Steve Miller] about this. Would not be surprised if he already started working on Lois.

So what was the secret project that disappeared into REDACTED?

U.S. Code 6104  refers to “Publicity of information required from certain exempt organizations and certain trusts”. That suggests that we’re on the right track. We don’t have any details on which section was being referred to but the IRS officials involved were clearly doing something dubious and trying to justify it by referencing a provision of the code involving information from tax exempt groups.

A later exchange suggests that Miller approved it.

There’s something very troubling when a bureaucracy with so much power over people launches secret research projects using non-profit donor lists.

  • ExRepug

    The issue was what to do with the donor lists in the application files: Pursuant to 26 U.S.C. section 6104 the files would become publicly accessible, thus if the donor lists were retained then the policy of not allowing public access to organizations’ donor Schedule B to the Form 990 would effectively be nullified.

    Other emails in the document batch discuss that Miller consulted with the Chief Counsel Office’s Procedures & Administration Division for how to handle this. Should the agency return the lists to the organizations or simply purge the administrative files? Per P&A’s advice, Miller decided that the donor lists would be purged from the administrative files. All lists were destroyed, except for two that were overlooked or were in closed files storage and were inadvertently retained.

    From the context of the email that the article is about, the “secret project” was Urban unilaterally doing legal research so that he could make the case that the lists could remain in the files under section 6104. That option had been taken off the table, so the other managers cut him out of the communications loop, which irritated Urban.

    • Moa

      If the “unilateral” research was “legal” then why keep it a secret? nice try IRS-shill.

      • Pete

        Ex-Republican Repugnant is definitely a civil(?)-servant.

        They are a tough cookie. They have spent 3 to 5 days on various websites on this one topic.

        They talk like someone who is a bureaucrat. I am not for sure if they are a lawyer one way or another but they are definitely a bureaucrat. And they play games with technicalities

        Stuff like whatever the unions did it was beyond the 5 statute of limitations so WTH are you going to do about it NYAH!

        The IRS computer were on average 7 year old, so expect them all to fail. It is good point (if true) as computer last 4 or 5 years although I have kept them longer. It does not say much for government procurement or IT.

        Then he or she make a big deal about the difference between archives and backups. It is like difference a sweater and jacket. When your spouse asks you for a sweater instead of a jacket, when they mean the jacket, you do not make a big fuss over it and refuse them. They just don’t want the pieces of the puzzle coming together until they can run out the clock (or ever).

        I would suggest that Ex-Repugnant Republican read Michael Grant’s book especially chapters 6, 10 & 11.
        ISBN 0-02–028560-4

        When they wonder where it all went wrong, they will know their part.

        • Moa

          It is amazing how fanatically evil people like ExRepug are. With their “hand in the cookie jar” they somehow think that minor technicalities will somehow get them off – as if TV law applied to reality.

          But the more they double-down (including posting to try deflect the clear criminality, just produces more evidence on sites like this) the more they are demonstrating that their intent to break the law and hide their tracks was deliberate.

          The amazing thing is they thought they’d never get caught. I suppose that is their arrogance – just like the Nazis thought they’d never get caught and would always win so would never have to justify their criminality.

          I do hope ExRepug is getting paid. When this is all unraveled, and it will be, then who got paid for what perversion of justice will be revealed – and at least they could get some money for the criminal records they’ll be gaining.

        • objectivefactsmatter

          “The IRS computer were on average 7 year old”

          Totally irrelevant statistic and probably based on some mendacious analysis as well.

          The kind of failures they’re claiming do not happen that way ever. It’s a combination of incompetence, lying and sophistry.

          “Then he or she make a big deal about the difference between archives and backups. It is like difference a sweater and jacket. When your spouse asks you for a sweater instead of a jacket, when they mean the jacket, you do not make a big fuss over it and refuse them. They just don’t want the pieces of the puzzle coming together until they can run out the clock (or ever).”

          If your wife is trying to deceive you then that’s an acceptable analogy.

          • Pete

            I won’t put it past Ex-Repug to outright lie in toto.

            The 7 year (lie?) would be an explanation for the crash in some cases. There was most likely some outright purposeful destruction.

            If I were a progammer or some other bureaucrat and I wanted data, I put in a request. It takes me 1 minute or less to fill out. It take me maybe 5m minutes total to walk over to (or email) the person or section, who will retrieve the data on night shift. At leas that is how it worked in a closed shop in state government.

            Archive or back up they just do not want to produce the data. They are using Fabian tactics (i.e delay).

            en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fabian_strategy

          • objectivefactsmatter

            None of it has anything to do with securing the data. None of it.

            That’s why the law requires fault tolerant systems with specific minimum requirements for what that must entail.

          • Pete

            It is just another thins i have to look up or read an article by a ‘real’ journalist. Ex-Repug sure can spew a lot of scheisse and he is somewhat slicker than MrUniteUs and Americana.

          • objectivefactsmatter

            Speaking of…

            http://www.fabians.org.uk

            Non-Marxist my ear.

            Yeah, they’re all crooks even when they’re not doing something blatantly illegal. Nonstop manipulation. And then when they get caught doing something criminal…oh boy.

          • Pete

            I was speaking of Quintus Fabius Maximus Verrucosus and tactics. I admire Quintus. He husbanded Roman lives.

            But a tactic (an ideal) is like a gun or some other object it can be used for good or evil.

            Mrs Hillary Clinton used Fabian tactics when she “misplaced” the Rose “law firm records in question. they were mysteriously found after the investigation was wound down.

            This is just the same deal writ larger.

            I don’t very much like the Fabian society either.

            “Billing-Records Gate: The records of Hillary Clinton’s clients at the Rose Law Firm in Arkansas were subpoenaed for years by investigators looking into Whitewater. They were finally discovered on a coffee table in the private quarters of the White House. No one ever explained how they got there.”

            http://www.nationalreview.com/article/354621/get-ready-all-hail-hillary-movies-john-fund

            ” or how those Rose Law firm billing records showed up on a WH coffee table, late one night, just as federal prosecutors were set to indict the sitting First Lady in the morning.”

            http://www.frumforum.com/karl-rove-unplugged/

          • objectivefactsmatter

            I gotcha. I just wanted to tie it together and confirm that you’re not imagining things. It’s part of their culture. Everything they do is connected one way or another to their little war with reality.

        • WhiteHunter

          Thank you, Pete. That’s the best dissection and analysis of the mindset, vocabulary, evasive hairsplitting on “technicalities,” and methods of this kind of criminal that I’ve ever read anywhere.

          It EXACTLY describes what we see every time one of them is lying before the Issa Committee.

          • Pete

            See Michael Grant’s book:

            The Fall of the Roman Empire

            ISBN 0-02–028560-4

            Ch 6 is The People against the Bureaucrats

            Mr grant’s book might not be the end all be all, but I think his perspective is interesting. There was perhaps no single cause.

            goodreads.com/book/show/628429.The_Fall_of_the_Roman_Empire

            barnesandnoble.com/w/the-fall-of-the-roman-empire-michael-grant/1000005990?ean=9780684829562

            amazon.com/Fall-Roman-Empire-Michael-Grant/dp/0684829568

        • ExRepug

          Lawyer, bucko. Certified tax law specialist.

          • objectivefactsmatter

            IOW, paid apologist.

          • ExRepug

            Wow. What an impressive and well-thought out
            rebuttal. Insults as empty posturing.

          • objectivefactsmatter

            Am I wrong? Are you not a paid apologist? How is that insulting? How is that posturing?

            No, I didn’t need to think a lot about it. What’s your point?

          • Pete

            ExRepug is scary. I am not intimidated, but that guy is dangerous. He has power and he is full of hubris. I have met his type before at the IRS.

            Most people I know in the military admire the Roman Empire. They know its’ faults. They can tick off the good points and the bad points (unlike a Leftists who only tick of bad points). They won’t defend the bad points. I remember such a discussion at the mess hall one day.

            Now the bad points. Around the time of the Diocletian reforms. Taxes became higher and so did tax avoidance. People would cut off their right thumb to avoid military service. Roman Senators ran off tax collectors so they could not assess their estates.

            Nowadays people do the same thing except they hire a lawyer or accountant to get it done.

            I have heard about 4 groups that want illegals. The RC so they can get b_tts into the pews. The Chamber of Commerce so they can get cheap labor. The military so they can get recruits. Of course the Democrat party wants them to get the votes. The upper class has been using mobs since the Roman Republican times and they have used them to intimidate, kill and vote. (Of course a person should study history for the examples and know why for the current state up until know. They should also study psychology and statistics). All ExRepug knows is his training as a lawyer (or what he remembers of it) and what faction is is for. The faction can change policies and principles.He doesn’t care so long as it is the winning factions and he is along for the ride. that is the calculus.)).

            I mention the illegals because of the people cutting off their right thumb. The military could not recruit from the people so they recruited outsiders (Germans, Steppe tribes, Arabs & others).

          • Pete

            I have spotted 2 economists posting here and on Truth Revolt. It is easy for me to spot them form their language and discipline. I respect them. They have discipline.

            I said i was not sure you were a lawyer. It must have been that whole lack of discipline thing. I have no respect for you unlike an economist. I could disagree with them but so long as they are using their training, i respect them.

            You are not to be respected.

            When will U.S. senators run you off? Do you get the question? Are you well read?

            When you meet people, do they still have their right thumbs? Do you get the question? Are you well read? Why would people do that to themselves? Do you get the modern analog?

          • ExRepug

            Dude, you are anonymous. Why do you think I care what some anonymous commenter on a nutter blog thinks about me? Give it some thought, son.

          • Pete

            You are useful in a certain sort of way. Keep posting.

      • ExRepug

        LOL. You don’t know what “legal research ” is! Instead of explaining it to you, I think I’ll just share your funny around the firm. The lawyers and law clerks will get a kick out of it.

        • objectivefactsmatter

          How does it serve your agenda when you act like an a-hole?

          I thought you were paid to explain the IRS? Does your attitude also reflect that of the IRS?

          Maybe now we’re getting an even clearer picture of why so many emails keep coming up “missing.”

          • ExRepug

            If you want to turn this into an insult contest, I am
            out. If you want to discuss the topics I
            am more than willing to do that.

          • objectivefactsmatter

            ExRepug • an hour ago: “If you want to turn this into an insult contest, I am
            out. If you want to discuss the topics I
            am more than willing to do that.”

            Me or you?

            ExRepug Moa • an hour ago: “LOL. You don’t know what “legal research ” is! Instead of explaining it to you, I think I’ll just share your funny around the firm. The lawyers and law clerks will get a kick out of it.”