A federal judge has ordered the IRS to explain "under oath" how the agency lost a trove of emails from the official at the heart of the Tea Party targeting scandal.
U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan gave the tax agency 30 days to file a declaration by an "appropriate official" to address the computer issues with ex-official Lois Lerner.
The decision came Thursday as part of a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit by conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch, which along with GOP lawmakers on Capitol Hill has questioned how the IRS lost the emails and, in some cases, had no apparent way to retrieve them.
The IRS first acknowledged it lost the emails in a letter to senators last month.
"In our view, there has been a cover-up that has been going on," Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said. "The Department of Justice, the IRS, had an obligation, an absolute obligation ... to alert the court and alert Judicial Watch as soon as they knew when these records were supposedly lost."
The IRS says it lost the emails in 2011 when Lerner's computer crashed. At the time, Lerner headed the IRS division that processes applications for tax-exempt status. She has since retired.
During the court hearing, Sullivan indicated he wanted the portion of the declaration on the computer issues to be wide-ranging, saying "that's about as broad as I can make it."
It also emerged at the status hearing that a Treasury Department inspector general probe into the matter is underway.
The lawyer representing the IRS, Geoffrey Klimas, argued that any further discovery in this case might impede the IG's investigation.
Sullivan seemed leery of that argument and also asked that the IRS official speak to that subject in the explanation the agency submits.
Further, Sullivan ordered that the IRS official explain how Lerner's files may be recovered through "other sources."
Fox News' Jake Gibson and Peter Doocy and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
They will just play dumb and obfuscate the issue as they always do. It is their playbook. Nothing will happen until Lerner's double-wide ass is sitting in a jail cell.
I want them to explain why they didn't restore these emails from backup tapes after the hard drives crashed. Also, why they didn't keep the email on servers which is how all large IT organizations do it.
Might be that the nonprofit division doesn't have any audit activity and charitable orgs never ever cheat on taxes or play politics, at least not the liberal ones which are all so good. Still, this is the outfit that makes US keep boxes and boxes laying around for backup if they decide to audit? Doesn't wash. Some bureaucrats need to be fired, stripped of their civil service rights and pension, and jailed until Social Security kicks in.
Did a private company make the back up software? If so couldn't they sue the IRS for defamation since the IRS is basically saying their software didn't work?
And thus it begins. It's never the offense that gets them, it's the cover up. Idiots...I mean really...what kind of idiot thinks you're going to get away with something tied to political gain?
The other part of the play book is the assertion that because an IG investigation has begun, they can't divulge the information. How many times has that been used in past scandals?
Thinking they won't be able to explain much of any of this away without looking more inept than a bunch of functionally illiterate 5th graders. Email by definition is not a single-source (computer) material so even suggesting that they '12-gauged' the problem wouldn't have made it gone. I really doubt that the world is so upside down that the government employs incompetent IT people while the best ones work for the smallest schools in remote pars of Alaska. Crashed computers don't easily keep their secrets safe.
If, and its a big if, they find emails directly linking the targeting to the liar in chief.....what then? I think that at a minimum Valerie Jarret was pulling the strings of the IRS.
So fast forward 6 mos. from now and the smoking gun is found.........What Then????
by requiring an individual human....i.e. somebody who can go to jail for perjury or obstruction....to give him the sworn declaration, the judge has upped the ante significantly.
can you imagine that meeting where they decide which IRS hack is going to sign it? and in so doing waive the Fifth as to its contents.
unless Barry has already signed a blank pardon for him, I don't know who they're going to get to sign it.
by requiring an individual human....i.e. somebody who can go to jail for perjury or obstruction....to give him the sworn declaration, the judge has upped the ante significantly.
can you imagine that meeting where they decide which IRS hack is going to sign it? and in so doing waive the Fifth as to its contents.
unless Barry has already signed a blank pardon for him, I don't know who they're going to get to sign it.
Somebody who's due to retire with full benefits within 6 months will be the signee. Then if anything in it is found to be false, the administration will claim they've already handled the issue.
Nothing outside of that unless the judge is a serious hard-case.
Did a private company make the back up software? If so couldn't they sue the IRS for defamation since the IRS is basically saying their software didn't work?
Just so happens that they canceled the email logging backup software license just before these crimes started. Oh so convenient.
If, and its a big if, they find emails directly linking the targeting to the liar in chief.....what then? I think that at a minimum Valerie Jarret was pulling the strings of the IRS.
So fast forward 6 mos. from now and the smoking gun is found.........What Then????
Some people in the White House claimed that there were no emails from Lerner during the missing 2 years.
by requiring an individual human....i.e. somebody who can go to jail for perjury or obstruction....to give him the sworn declaration, the judge has upped the ante significantly.
can you imagine that meeting where they decide which IRS hack is going to sign it? and in so doing waive the Fifth as to its contents.
unless Barry has already signed a blank pardon for him, I don't know who they're going to get to sign it.
Somebody who's due to retire with full benefits within 6 months will be the signee. Then if anything in it is found to be false, the administration will claim they've already handled the issue.
Nothing outside of that unless the judge is a serious hard-case.
he is a hard case....this is the guy who appointed a special prosecuter to investigate the Justice Dept. after the frame up job they did on Ted Stevens. He will take scalps if they give him the chance.
by requiring an individual human....i.e. somebody who can go to jail for perjury or obstruction....to give him the sworn declaration, the judge has upped the ante significantly.
Yep!!
Had she just fessed up, she would have received a slap on the wrist at best. Now she can go to jail.
And thus it begins. It's never the offense that gets them, it's the cover up. Idiots...I mean really...what kind of idiot thinks you're going to get away with something tied to political gain?
They'll get away with it.
The IRS is joined at the hip with the money people.
by requiring an individual human....i.e. somebody who can go to jail for perjury or obstruction....to give him the sworn declaration, the judge has upped the ante significantly.
can you imagine that meeting where they decide which IRS hack is going to sign it? and in so doing waive the Fifth as to its contents.
unless Barry has already signed a blank pardon for him, I don't know who they're going to get to sign it.
Somebody who's due to retire with full benefits within 6 months will be the signee. Then if anything in it is found to be false, the administration will claim they've already handled the issue.
Nothing outside of that unless the judge is a serious hard-case.
he is a hard case....this is the guy who appointed a special prosecuter to investigate the Justice Dept. after the frame up job they did on Ted Stevens. He will take scalps if they give him the chance.
That's good to hear. Track 'em down and string 'em up.
Tempting as it might be, there seems no point in thinking about an explanatory or satisfying outcome based technical capabilities, judicial rulings/sanctions, normal governing logic or the rule of law.
From the onset, throughout the rotten Dem behavior and eventual "discovery" process -- and even now - this has been a matter of filthy power politics. It will remain so - there will be no wholesale retribution for government types, and no correction. Sad, but true.
The second lois lerner said "I plead the 5th" she should have been out the door and not allowed to return to her office, stripped of her retirement benefits, be forced to return any bonuses and she should have been audited.
The fact that congress has not made a law stating as such means they are just a culpable as lois. Our congress is the problem and lois lerner is just a symptom. kwg
