Judicial Watch Claims John McCain Tied To IRS Targeting of Conservative Tea Party Groups!

President Trump took it one step further in a recent video making it very clear that he was never a fan of John McCain and never will be:

And after all the news that is now coming out, who could blame Trump?

I wouldn't be a fan of John McCain either if he tried to torpedo me on multiple occassions!  

But here's where the story really takes off.  

Tom Fitton and the folks over at Judicial Watch are now reporting that it may have been McCain behind the Lois Lerner IRS scandal that targeted conservative Tea Party groups!

If so, that's a major scandal and a gross abuse of the power of the IRS and federal government!

Watch this video from Tom Fitton:

And here's more, from Judicial Watch:

Judicial Watch today released newly obtained internal IRS documents, including material revealing that Sen. John McCain’s former staff director and chief counsel on the Senate Homeland Security Permanent Subcommittee, Henry Kerner, urged top IRS officials, including then-director of exempt organizations Lois Lerner, to “audit so many that it becomes financially ruinous.”  Kerner was appointed by President Trump as Special Counsel for the United States Office of Special Counsel.

The explosive exchange was contained in notes taken by IRS employees at an April 30, 2013, meeting between Kerner, Lerner, and other high-ranking IRS officials. Just ten days following the meeting, former IRS director of exempt organizations Lois Lerner admitted that the IRS had a policy of improperly and deliberately delaying applications for tax-exempt status from conservative non-profit groups.

Lerner and other IRS officials met with select top staffers from the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee in a “marathon” meeting to discuss concerns raised by both Sen. Carl Levin (D-MI) and Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) that the IRS was not reining in political advocacy groups in response to the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision.  Senator McCain had been the chief sponsor of the McCain-Feingold Act and called the Citizens United decision, which overturned portions of the Act, one of the “worst decisions I have ever seen.”

In the full notes of an April 30 meeting, McCain’s high-ranking staffer Kerner recommends harassing non-profit groups until they are unable to continue operating. Kerner tells Lerner, Steve Miller, then chief of staff to IRS commissioner, Nikole Flax, and other IRS officials, “Maybe the solution is to audit so many that it is financially ruinous.” In response, Lerner responded that “it is her job to oversee it all:”

Henry Kerner asked how to get to the abuse of organizations claiming section 501 (c)(4) but designed to be primarily political. Lois Lerner said the system works, but not in real time. Henry Kerner noted that these organizations don’t disclose donors. Lois Lerner said that if they don’t meet the requirements, we can come in and revoke, but it doesn’t happen timely. Nan Marks said if the concern is that organizations engaging in this activity don’t disclose donors, then the system doesn’t work. Henry Kerner said that maybe the solution is to audit so many that it is financially ruinous. Nikole noted that we have budget constraints. Elise Bean suggested using the list of organizations that made independent expenditures. Lois Lerner said that it is her job to oversee it all, not just political campaign activity.

Judicial Watch previously reported on the 2013 meeting.  Senator McCain then issued a statement decrying “false reports claiming that his office was somehow involved in IRS targeting of conservative groups.”   The IRS previously blacked out the notes of the meeting but Judicial Watch found the notes among subsequent documents released by the agency.

Judicial Watch separately uncovered that Lerner was under significant pressure from both Democrats in Congress and the Obama DOJ and FBI to prosecute and jail the groups the IRS was already improperly targeting. In discussing pressure from Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (Democrat-Rhode Island) to prosecute these “political groups,” Lerner admitted, “it is ALL about 501(c)(4) orgs and political activity.”

The April 30, 2013 meeting came just under two weeks prior to Lerner’s admission during an ABA meeting that the IRS had “inappropriately” targeted conservative groups.  In her May 2013 answer to a planted question, in which she admitted to the “absolutely incorrect, insensitive, and inappropriate” targeting of Tea Party and conservative groups, Lerner suggested the IRS targeting occurred due to an “uptick” in 501 (c)(4) applications to the IRS but in actuality, there had been a decrease in such applications in 2010.

On May 14, 2013, a report by Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration revealed: “Early in Calendar Year 2010, the IRS began using inappropriate criteria to identify organizations applying for tax-exempt status” (e.g., lists of past and future donors). The illegal IRS reviews continued “for more than 18 months” and “delayed processing of targeted groups’ applications” in advance of the 2012 presidential election.

All these documents were forced out of the IRS as a result of an October 2013 Judicial Watch Freedom of Information (FOIA) lawsuit filed against the IRS after it failed to respond adequately to four FOIA requests sent in May 2013 (Judicial Watch, Inc. v. Internal Revenue Service(No. 1:13-cv-01559)). Judicial Watch is seeking:

• All records related to the number of applications received or related to communications between the IRS and members of the U.S. House of Representatives or the U.S. Senate regarding the review process for organizations applying for tax exempt status under 501(c)(4);
• All records concerning communications between the IRS and the Executive Branch or any other government agency regarding the review process for organizations applying for tax exempt status under 501(c)(4);
• Copies of any questionnaires and all records related to the preparation of questionnaires sent to organizations applying for 501(c)(4) tax exempt status.
• All records related to Lois Lerner’s communication with other IRS employees, as well as government or private entity outside the IRS regarding the review and approval process for 501 (c)(4) applicant organizations.

“The Obama IRS scandal is bipartisan – McCain and Democrats who wanted to regulate political speech lost at the Supreme Court, so they sought to use the IRS to harass innocent Americans,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “The Obama IRS scandal is not over – as Judicial Watch continues to uncover smoking gun documents that raise questions about how the Obama administration weaponized the IRS, the FEC, FBI, and DOJ to target the First Amendment rights of Americans.”

And more from the Washington Times:

In the summer of 2014, the Congressional Tea Party caucus held a meeting on Capitol Hill and invited the leaders of about 20 Tea Party groups. The meeting was to discuss strategy. As the meeting wound down, the door to the meeting room opened and in came Sen. John McCain.

The senator from Arizona received a polite but cool reception. He rambled for a couple of minutes, thanking the group for their work and asking them to work with him and the Republicans.

The reception would have been considerably less friendly had the Tea Party leaders known about the actions of Mr. McCain’s former staff director and chief counsel only a year earlier.

In April 2013, Henry Kerner, who was Mr. McCain’s staff director and chief counsel, met with Lois Lerner and others from the IRS. This was only weeks before the IRS targeting scandal broke. Mr. Kerner was meeting with the IRS to discuss 501(c)4 organizations. These were the activist organizations that the IRS tried to shut down. At least it was the conservative organizations that the IRS tried to destroy.

In this meeting, while discussing the issue of the 501(c)4 groups, Mr. Kerner suggested the IRS go after these groups by auditing them and audit “so many, it becomes financially ruinous.”

Mr. Kerner wanted to help Lois Lerner and Barack Obama destroy political organizations — to use the power of government to bankrupt these groups and silence them. It defies belief to think Mr. Kerner went to this meeting and offered this opinion without the explicit blessing from and direction of Mr. McCain. Though the office of the senior senator from Arizona has said allegations that he was involved in the IRS‘ targeting “have no merit.”

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