Investigators from the House Ways and Means Committee are now eyeing Joseph Grant — a top IRS official who officially retired on Monday — and his role, if any, in efforts to target conservative nonprofits. House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa has claimed that the IRS agents’ actions “were directly being ordered from Washington.”
Grant could prove a key steppingstone in the GOP drive to link the IRS controversy to officials inside the Obama administration. Based in D.C., Grant was the head of the Tax Exempt and Government Entities Division until he announced his decision to leave the IRS last month…
“He is definitely someone we’ve been interested in,” a Ways and Means Committee staffer involved in the IRS probe said of Grant, speaking on condition of anonymity. “Our investigation has been looking at all of the players and Joseph Grant was in charge of the exempt organization division, above [Director of Exempt Organizations Lois] Lerner. Clearly, his knowledge or however he was involved, whether it was telling people to cut it out … that is something we’re looking at … He is definitely involved in the same way Miller and Lerner are involved, but we don’t have a good grasp on the role.”
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