IRS employee suspended for urging taxpayers to 'reelect President Obama'

One of the many damning emails sent by former IRS official Lois Lerner before her critical and potentially damning communications mysteriously vanished was what the press dubbed a “joke” about how the former head of the tax-exemption division wanted to join Team Obama’s political wing. She wasn’t the only IRS employee who apparently flirted with giving President Barack Obama a political boost from their position at the nation’s tax collection agency.

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According to a release from the United States Office of Special Counsel (OSC) regarding two recently resolved cases pertaining to violations of the Hatch Act, one IRS employee was recently suspended after it had been determined that the employee “urged taxpayers to reelect President Barack Obama in 2012.”

“OSC’s complaint alleged that, when fielding taxpayers’ questions on an IRS customer service help line, the employee repeatedly urged taxpayers to reelect President Obama in 2012 by delivering a chant based on the spelling of the employee’s last name,” the OSC release read. “In the settlement agreement resolving the complaint, the IRS employee acknowledged that he had used his authority and influence as an IRS customer service representative for a political purpose and did so while at work.”

The employee agreed to a 100-day suspension as part of an agreement resolving this violation of federal law.

This complaint was first revealed on April 9 when the OSC announced that it was seeking “significant disciplinary action” against this unnamed IRS customer-service representative.

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That news came as another IRS official in a Kentucky office was suspended for two weeks after telling a taxpayer that she was “for” the Democrats because the Republican platform sought to “cap my pension” and “to take women back 40 years.”

“I’m not supposed to voice my opinion so you didn’t hear me saying that,” the disciplined tax specialist told the person on the other end of the recorded phone conversation.

In all the many complaints lodged against the conduct of IRS officials, it makes you wonder why you never see any alleging an IRS employee displayed a disturbing pro-Republican bias.

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Ed Morrissey 12:40 PM | December 16, 2024
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