WASHINGTON - The man who led the Internal Revenue Service when it was giving extra scrutiny to Tea Party and other conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status told Congress on Tuesday that he knew little about what was happening while he was still commissioner.
Douglas Shulman, who vacated his position last November when his five-year term expired, told the Senate Finance Committee that he didn’t learn all the facts until he read last week’s report by a Treasury inspector general that confirmed the targeting strategy.
In his first public remarks since the story broke, Shulman said: “I agree this is an issue that when someone spotted it, they should have brought it up the chain. And they didn’t. I don’t know why.”
Shulman testified at Congress’ second hearing on an episode that has largely consumed Washington since an IRS official acknowledged the targeting and apologized for it in remarks to a legal group on May 10. Shulman and the two officials who testified at Tuesday’s 3½ -hour session - the outgoing acting commissioner, Steven Miller, and J. Russell George, the Treasury Department inspector general who issued the report - were all sworn in as witnesses, an unusual step for the finance panel.
Shulman said he first learned about the targeting and about the inspector general’s investigation in the spring of 2012, during the presidential election. He said that in a meeting with Miller, he was told that IRS workers were using a list to help decide which groups seeking tax-exempt status should get special attention, that the term “Tea Party” was on that list and that the problem was being addressed. But, he said, he didn’t know what other words were on that list or the scope and severity of the activity.
Pressed by committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., on how the improper screening system could have occurred in the first place, Shulman said, “Mr. Chairman, I can’t say. I can’t say that I know that answer.”
Shulman said he took what he thought were the proper steps - making sure the inspector general was looking into the situation. He said he did not tell Treasury officials about the improper activity.
“This is not the kind of information” that, with an inspector general’s probe under way, “should leave the IRS,” Shulman said.
Asked by Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, whether he owed conservative groups an apology, Shulman said, “I’m certainly not personally responsible for creating a list that had inappropriate criteria on it.”
That was a reference to a list of words that IRS workers looked for in deciding which groups to screen, a list that included the terms “Tea Party” and “patriot.”
“I very much regret that it happened and that it happened on my watch,” Shulman said.
George’s report blamed ineffective management for allowing agents to inappropriately target conservative groups for more than 18 months during the 2010 and 2012 elections. Shulman was appointed by President George W. Bush and served from March 2008 until last November.
On Tuesday, Republicans expressed anger that Shulman and Miller didn’t reveal the screening to Congress. Miller reportedly learned of the situation in early May 2012.
“Mr. Miller, that’s a lie by omission,” said Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah, top Republican on the finance committee.
President Barack Obama has forced Miller to resign, and Miller is leaving office this week.
Miller took responsibility Tuesday for planting a question May 10 at a private meeting with tax lawyers that prompted the disclosure that the agency had targeted conservative groups.
The story burst into the public earlier this month when a question at an American Bar Association meeting prompted Lois Lerner, who heads the IRS’ division on tax-exempt organizations, to concede misconduct and apologize to conservative groups.
Miller, testifying before the Senate Finance Committee on Tuesday, said top IRS officials knew that a Treasury inspector general audit was pending that would accuse the agency of misconduct.
“We thought we’d get out an apology,” Miller said. “Obviously, the entire thing was an incredibly bad idea.”
Lerner, who was subpoenaed to testify today before the House Oversight Committee, said Tuesday evening that she plans to invoke her constitutional right against self-incrimination and decline to testify.
In a letter to committee leaders, Lerner’s lawyer said she was refusing because of a criminal investigation by the Justice Department.
The lawyer, William Taylor, said that his client “has not committed any crime or made any misrepresentation, but under the circumstances she has no choice but to take this course.”
Ali Ahmad, a spokesman for committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., said the subpoena stands, raising the possibility of a public spectacle in which Lerner would decline to answer question after question.
Information for this article was contributed by Alan Fram, Stephen Ohlemacher, Martin Crutsinger and Henry C. Jackson of The Associated Press; and by Jonathan Weisman of The New York Times.
Front Section, Pages 2 on 05/22/2013