Washington, DC – A new letter from the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) provides the following facts showing “progressive” groups did not face the same targeting by the IRS that tea party groups did.

In the letter, TIGTA concludes:

• In its audit, TIGTA “reviewed all cases the IRS identified as potential political cases and did not limit our audit to allegations related to the Tea Party.”
• From that review, TIGTA did not find evidence that the “progressives” criteria was used by the IRS to select potential political cases during the 2010-2012 timeframe.  The letter goes on to note, “we found no indication in any of these other materials that ‘Progressives’ was a term used to refer cases for scrutiny for political campaign intervention.”
• However, TIGTA reaffirms Tea Party groups were specifically targeted by the IRS, noting, “[O]ur audit found that 100 percent of the tax-exempt applications with Tea Party, Patriots, or 9/12 in their names were processed as potential political cases…”

Adding to the TIGTA letter, Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp (R-MI) stated, “So far, the evidence only shows conservatives being systematically targeted by the IRS, not just flagged through the BOLO, but actually targeted.  The IG has confirmed that, and the investigation by the Ways and Means and Oversight and Government Reform Committees also confirms that fact.  Americans deserve better than to fear whether the IRS will unfairly target them.  One thing is clear, Congress has a lot more work to do to bring this out of control agency in check and hold them accountable to the American people.”