In a move that will no doubt shock ranking House Oversight Committee member, Democrat Rep. Elijah “the case is solved” Cummings, Darrell Issa is recalling disgraced IRS official Lois Lerner to a March 5 hearing:
Republicans in Congress have been licking their chops for nine months at the prospect of grilling embattled former IRS official Lois Lerner a second time, and they’ll get their chance two weeks from now.
Rep. Darrell Issa, who chairs the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, has called Lerner back for a second hearing about a program that saw the IRS targeting tea party organizations and other right-leaning groups with intrusive questions and years-long delays when they applied for nonprofit tax-exempt status beginning in 2009.
Lerner appeared in a committee hearing in May 2013 but refused to answer questions, invoking her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.
But because she offered an opening statement in which she insisted ‘I have not done anything wrong,’ committee members ruled that she had waived that privilege.
In a letter to Lerner’s lawyer on Tuesday, Issa set March 5 as the date she will have to answer probing questions about her role in the scandal – and possibly finger higher-ups who directed her to play political favorites and hamstring conservative applicants.
Lerner, who retired in September with full benefits after a brief period of administration leave, is ‘is uniquely positioned to provide testimony that will help the committee better understand how and why the IRS targeted these groups,’ Issa wrote.
‘The subpoena you accepted on Ms. Lerner’s behalf remains in effect,’ he told attorney William W. Taylor III.
Stephen Miller admits the targeting was absolutely partisan and a bad idea. Lois Lerner pleading the fifth. Yep, there’s not a “smidgen of corruption” at the IRS and it’s totally a phony scandal, or something.