The IRS asked questions about religion, as well as other personal and irrelevant questions; questions that aren't standard.
Weirdest IRS Questions for the Tea Party: Views, Donors, and Etymology - ABC News
questions that were designed to determine whether the applicant organization was eligible for 501c(4) status under the established criteria. to determine whether the applicant entity was an issue advocacy organization or one primarily engaged in political activities
The link I posted clearly states that the IRS admitted to targeting groups with, "tea party", in their name. So...yes, they were.
from the previous cite:
They constituted about one-quarter of the 300 groups who were flagged for additional analysis by employees of the IRS tax-exempt unit’s main office in Cincinnati.
let me remind you that one-quarter is half of a half. and now let's examine what you previously posted:
Why were ONLY groups with "tea party" and "patriot" the ones targetted?
[emphasis added by bubba to make a stronger - more obvious - point]
hopefully, you now realize that the tea party applicants could not be both one-quarter of those flagged and also be the ONLY applicants selected to be subject to more scrutiny
No such law exists. However, there's damn sure a law that prohibits government employees from engaging in partisanship
here you go, this is when the 501c(4) firms were able to engage in partisan politics but only where such activity was not its "primary" activity:
[An] organization may carry on lawful political activities and remain exempt under section 501(c)(4) as long as it is primarily engaged in activities that promote social welfare.
The History of the 501(c)(4) Exemption - Law Blog - WSJ
How does membership to Facebook disqualify a group from non-profit eligibility?
i don't know. why don't you share the fact information where you allege that actually happened. once i see what you are referring to, i should then be able to explain it for you
Either way, the application should either be granted/denied by way of a standard criteria,
then, by all means, please tell us the simple mechanism which should be used to determine which 501c(4) applicants are engaged in political activity as their primary activity
i look forward to seeing this standard criteria being benchmarked for the IRS to use
... not questions invented especially to target a specific group, for political reasons.
there are no political reasons why the IRS staff must assess the legitimacy of the applicants in relation to the established criteria to evaluate whether a firm meeting the 501c(4) criteria. they do it because that is their job; to monitor and assess compliance with the law, regulations, and standard operating procedures
The fact that the applications were held in limbo for 12 plus months is evidence that these groups were denied their right to due process.
wrong once again
each of those firms had the opportunity to hold itself out as a 501c(4) entity. but if they self certified as such, and were then found to be other than an eligible organization, the entity would have to account for all that it was not previously held accountable to do while pretending to be a 501c(4) company
If that were the case, then why weren't the applications denied, outright?
where it was obvious they were not compliant with the provisions for 501c(4) certification, they would have been immediately denied. but share with us what benchmark should be used to determine whether "it is primarily engaged in activities that promote social welfare"
if the standard were still that the firm must be
entirely engaged in social welfare promotion, then ANY hint of partisan political activity would prevent the IRS from awarding a 501c(4) confirmation. but when it moved to a standard that the applicant's PRIMARY activity must be social welfare promotion, the IRS employee must now be able to make a determination whether the applicant's political activities rose to the degree of being its PRIMARY activity. in order to make such a determination, the employee must know and understand the totality of activities by the applicant. not a simple or quick task. now multiply it times the 300 applicants to be evaluated. which hopefully explains the legitimate basis of delay
Why were these groups asked questions about their religion? Questions like that are discriminatory in nature and therefore another civil rights violation.
share with us the specific questions you found to be civil rights violations
To top it all off, Lerner invoked the 5th Amendment, which proves she broke the law.
now, you have been prone to post many foolish things. none more misguided than that statement
she like you, and i, has a right to assert her fifth amendment rights
your foolish position then becomes that for one to assert their Constitutional rights causes them to be in violation of the law. read it again. your stated position is profound. profoundly ignorant