All Roads Point to White House in IRS Scandal

by John M. Curtis
(310) 204-8700

Copyright June 3, 2013
All Rights Reserved.                                      

          Known as a right wing flamethrower, 59-year-old House chairman of the Government Oversight and Reform Committee Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) ripped White House Press Secretary Jay Carney as a “paid liar.”  Carney insisted, since the scandal broke May 14 when the IRS Inspector General’s report revealed that “inappropriate criteria” were used to scrutinize Tea Party an other conservative groups applying for tax exempt status un the 501 (c) (4) nonprofit status, that President Barack Obama was not in the loop.  Issa called Carney a “paid liar,” Sunday, June 2 on CNN’s “State of the Union” with John King.  While criticized for being overly blunt, Issa’s comments mirror the growing frustration over the White House response of the IRS scandal.  Issa contends that IRS targeting right wing groups was “a problems that was coordinated, in all likelihood, right out of Washington headquarters,” referring to the West Wing.

             Reacting to Issa’s accusation, Carney refused to get into the fray.  “I hadn’t heard that.  That’s amazing,” said Carney sarcastically, causing chuckles in the Brady White House Briefing Room.  “I’m not going to get into a back and forth with Chairman Issa,” suggesting, at the very least, that Carney’s not willing to get into specifics or put anything unnecessary on the record.  When IRS Director of Tax-Exempt Organizations Lois Lerner faced Issa’s committee May 22, she read a brief statement proclaiming her innocence then took the 5th Amendment.  Lerner insisted she refused to talk on the advice of counsel, while, at the same time, reading a prepared statement.  “Because I’m asserting my right not to testify, I know some people will assume that I’ve done something wrong.  I have not,” read Lerner, protesting her innocence to the committee, then clamming up.

             Invoking the Fifth opened up a can of worms for the administration.  Whatever the White House says about partisan politics, the head of Tax-Exempt Organizations had just taken the Fifth.  “I have done nothing wrong.  I have not broken any laws.  I have not violated any IRS rules and regulations, and I have not provided any false information to this or any other congressional committee,” said Lerner’s statement, refusing cross- examination.  Most legal experts don’t think Lerner can make a written statement, then declare the Fifth.  Most think making a statement waives her right against self-incrimination.  Whether Issa subpoena’s Lerner back to the committee to either submit to cross-examination or strike her statement for the Congressional record is anyone’s guess.   Lerner’s categorical denials and self-exonerating statements raise far more suspicions than had she said nothing.

             Quoting from IRS report May 22, Carney insisted the Inspector General did not implicate higher-ups at the White House.  Carney also knows that there’s nothing in the IG’s report that rules out the White House.  Carney told the press that White House Counsel Kathryn Ruemmier learned about the IG’s report in April and made a decision to not tell the present.  That’s Carney’s story.  Issa can’t assume that the president and Vice President Joe Biden were not informed.  Keeping a major breach of IRS policy and potentially devastating scandal from the president and vice president is not credible.   Carney admitted that White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough was informed about the IG’s report accusing the IRS of  “inappropriate” targeting of right leaning 501 (c) (4) nonprofits.  Suggesting that McDonough kept a potential scandal from the president is equally incredulous. 

            Carney’s explanation that it would have been “inappropriate” for the White House to get involved in an ongoing investigation is preposterous.  If a member of the White House staff acts illegally or inappropriately, of course the White House should be involved in getting to the bottom of any wrongdoing.  “It’s no so much that Carney was off by about three weeks,” said a GOP aide.  “It’s just that every time we get a story, it’s different.  That’s why, instead of relying on a spokesman with an agenda, we agree with the president that there needs to be an investigation.”  So far, Atty. Gen. Eric Holder, mired in his own scandal for investigating the press, has not appointed a special or independent counsel.  “The cardinal rule is to not intervene in any independent investigation or take any steps that could be seen a intervening,” said Carney, May 22.  “That’s what we abided by, and that’s what any White House should do.”          

             Carney’s off-the-wall saying the he should do everything in his power to prevent the president from knowing about a budding White House scandal.  Asking the public to believe that the right thing to do was to keep the president ignorant stretches plausible deniablity to the breaking point.  Based on Carney’s public remarks, Issa’s only guilty of politically incorrect speech.  All indications point to toward a White House scandal, going from the situation room to the Oval Office.  Carney’s point that it’s inappropriate for the White House to interfere with an ongoing investigation by stonewalling stretches logic like a bungie cord.  Telling the press or Congressional investigators what you know doesn’t interfere with any investigation:  It shows openness and transparency.  When government officials like Lerner tell Congressional Committees they’re taking the Fifth, it tells the real story.

John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news.  He's editor of OnlineColumnist.com.and author of Dodging the Bullet and Operation Charisma.