President Clinton failed to appoint members to an Internal Revenue
Service Oversight Board mandated by Congress in 1998, WorldNetDaily has
learned.
The IRS Restructuring and Reform Act of 1998 became law on July 22 of
last year giving the president six months to appoint members to the
Oversight Board, according to Trent Duffey, spokesman for the House Ways
and Means Committee. The six-month deadline was Jan. 22 of this year.
“They (the White House) were supposed to pick an independent
oversight board six months after enactment, and it’s now over a year,”
said Duffey. “They opposed the creation of an independent oversight
board from the very beginning. Only with great stubbornness by (Rep.
Bill) Archer and (Sen. William) Roth were we able to keep that in the
final law. They have yet to forward any names.”
Rep. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, a key architect of the 1998 IRS Reform law,
believes the president’s failure to appoint members to the board is a
cause for concern. Commenting on the passing of the one-year
anniversary of the IRS reform enactment, Portman said, “The
administration’s continued failure to follow the law and nominate
members for the Oversight Board should be a source of concern to all
taxpayers. Over the years, the IRS has been remarkably resistant to
change. The Oversight Board is needed to ensure the IRS is held
accountable for its actions, taxpayers are treated fairly and the
reforms are sustained over time.”
The purpose of the board, as stated in the U.S. Code, is to hold
regular meetings making sure the IRS is following the spirit and letter
of the law.
“In general, the Oversight Board shall oversee the Internal Revenue
Service in its administration, management, conduct, direction, and
supervision of the execution and application of the internal revenue
laws or related statutes and tax conventions to which the United States
is a party,” the U.S. Code reads.
Commenting once again on the law, Duffey said, “It was designed to
make the IRS more responsive to taxpayers. Supposedly, they’re doing
better. Audits are down. No one is ever completely satisfied with
these people — no one likes tax collectors — even going back to the
Bible.”
Although the numbers of audits may be down, this “relief” comes late
for the many organizations and individuals who have endured audits —
especially those that suspect the motivations may be political.
One such audit was that of the Western Journalism Center, the parent
company of WorldNetDaily. In 1996, during the audit, IRS agent Thomas
Cederquist announced the case was political and the decision about the
organization’s fate would be made at the national level. Most recently,
WorldNetDaily, through a Freedom of Information Act request, received
documents from the Treasury Department tracing a 1994 letter that had
been sent from Paul Venze, a Los Angeles-area resident, to the White
House.
Venze, in the letter, expressed concern that Western Journalism
Center, a non-profit organization, was violating its non-profit status
by publishing investigative reports concerning the death of White House
Deputy Counsel Vincent Foster. The letter, the FOIA documents show, was
sent from the White House to the IRS, and soon after, the audit began.
The 1998 law passed by Congress included a provision making it a
crime for the president or vice president to request — directly or
indirectly — an IRS audit. The bill was a direct response to the furor
of political audits raised by the Western Journalism Center’s
revelations in 1996.
Whether or not the White House violated the law in its earlier audits
will be up to the courts to decide. Western Journalism Center is
pressing a $10 million lawsuit against IRS and executive branch
officials. But there is no doubt in Duffey’s mind the White House is
derelict in its responsibility regarding the IRS Restructuring and
Reform Act of 1998.
“It’s defied the letter of the law absolutely,” Duffey said.
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