III 

113TH CONGRESS 

2D SESSION S. RES. 487 

Expressing the sense of the Senate that Attorney General Eric H. Holder, 

Jr. should appoint a special counsel or prosecutor to investigate the 

targeting of conservative nonprofit groups by the Internal Revenue Service. 

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 

JUNE 26, 2014 

Mr. CRUZ submitted the following resolution; which was referred to the 

Committee on the Judiciary 

RESOLUTION 

Expressing the sense of the Senate that Attorney General 

Eric H. Holder, Jr. should appoint a special counsel 

or prosecutor to investigate the targeting of conservative 

nonprofit groups by the Internal Revenue Service. 

Whereas, in February 2010, the Internal Revenue Service 

(IRS) began targeting conservative nonprofit groups for 

extra scrutiny in connection with applications for tax-exempt status; 

Whereas, on May 14, 2013, the Treasury Inspector General 

for Tax Administration (TIGTA) issued an audit report 

entitled, ‘‘Inappropriate Criteria Were Used to Identify 

Tax-Exempt Applications for Review’’; 


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Whereas the TIGTA audit report found that from 2010 until 

2012, the IRS systematically subjected tax-exempt applicants to extra scrutiny based on inappropriate criteria, 

including use of the phrases ‘‘Tea Party’’, ‘‘Patriots’’, 

and ‘‘9/12’’; 

Whereas the TIGTA audit report found that the groups selected for extra scrutiny based on inappropriate criteria 

were subjected without cause to delays lasting years; 

Whereas the TIGTA audit report found that the groups selected for extra scrutiny based on inappropriate criteria 

were subjected to unreasonable and burdensome information requests, including requests for information about 

donors and political beliefs; 

Whereas the Exempt Organizations Division within the TaxExempt and Government Entities Division of the IRS 

has jurisdiction over the processing and determination of 

tax-exempt applications; 

Whereas, on September 15, 2010, Lois G. Lerner, former Director of the Exempt Organizations Division, initiated a 

project to examine political activity of organizations described in section 501(c)(4) of the Internal Revenue Code 

of 1986, writing to her colleagues, ‘‘[w]e need to be cautious so it isn’t a per se political project’’; 

Whereas, on February 1, 2011, Lois Lerner wrote that the 

‘‘Tea Party matter [was] very dangerous’’ and ‘‘[t]his 

could be the vehicle to go to court on the issue of whether 

Citizen’s [sic] United overturning the ban on corporate 

spending applies to tax exempt rules’’; 

Whereas Lois Lerner ordered the Tea Party tax-exempt applications to proceed through a ‘‘multi-tier review’’ involvVerDate Mar 15 2010 02:55 Jun 27, 2014 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00002 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6300 E:\BILLS\SR487.IS SR487

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ing her senior technical advisor and the IRS Office of 

Chief Counsel; 

Whereas Carter Hull, an IRS lawyer and a 48-year veteran 

of the United States Government, testified that the 

‘‘multi-tier review’’ was unprecedented in his experience; 

Whereas, on June 1, 2011, Holly Paz, Director of Rulings 

and Agreements within the Exempt Organizations Division, requested the tax-exempt application filed by Crossroads Grassroots Policy Strategies for review by Lois 

Lerner’s senior technical advisor; 

Whereas, on March 22, 2012, Commissioner of Internal Revenue Douglas Shulman was specifically asked about the 

targeting of Tea Party groups applying for tax-exempt 

status during a hearing before the Committee on Ways 

and Means of the House of Representatives, to which he 

replied, ‘‘I can give you assurances . . . [t]here is absolutely no targeting’’; 

Whereas, on April 26, 2012, Lois Lerner informed the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform of the 

House of Representatives that information requests were 

done in ‘‘the ordinary course of the application process’’; 

Whereas prior to the November 2012 election, the IRS provided 31 applications for tax-exempt status to the investigative website ProPublica, all of which were from conservative groups and 9 of which had not yet been approved by the IRS, in spite of a prohibition under Federal law against public disclosure of application materials 

until after the application has been approved; 

Whereas the IRS determined, by way of informal, internal review, that 75 percent of the applications for designation 

as an organization described in section 501(c)(4) of the 


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Internal Revenue Code of 1986 that were set aside for 

further review were filed by conservative-oriented organizations; 

Whereas, on January 24, 2013, Lois Lerner wrote, in an email to colleagues, regarding Organizing for Action, a 

tax-exempt organization formed as an offshoot of the 

election campaign of President Barack Obama: ‘‘Maybe 

I can get the DC office job!’’; 

Whereas, on May 8, 2013, Richard Pilger, Director of the 

Election Crimes Branch of the Public Integrity Section of 

the Department of Justice, spoke to Lois Lerner about 

potential prosecution for false statements about political 

campaign intervention made by tax-exempt applicants; 

Whereas, on May 10, 2013, in response to a pre-arranged 

question, Lois Lerner apologized for the targeting of conservative tax-exempt applicants by the IRS during a 

speech at an event organized by the American Bar Association; 

Whereas the Committee on Ways and Means of the House of 

Representatives determined that, of the 298 applications 

delayed and set aside for additional scrutiny by the IRS, 

83 percent were from right-leaning organizations; 

Whereas the Committee on Ways and Means of the House of 

Representatives determined that, as of the May 10, 2013, 

apology from Lois Lerner, only 45 percent of the rightleaning groups set aside for extra scrutiny had been approved, while 70 percent of left-leaning groups and 100 

percent of the groups with ‘‘progressive’’ names had been 

approved; 

Whereas the Committee on Ways and Means of the House of 

Representatives determined that, of the groups that were 


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inappropriately subject to demands to divulge confidential 

donors, 89 percent were right-leaning; 

Whereas, on May 15, 2013, Attorney General Eric H. Holder, Jr. testified before the Committee on the Judiciary of 

the House of Representatives that the Department of 

Justice would conduct a ‘‘dispassionate’’ investigation 

into the IRS matter, and ‘‘[t]his will not be about parties 

. . . this will not be about ideological persuasions . . . 

anybody who has broken the law will be held accountable’’; 

Whereas, on May 15, 2013, President Barack Obama called 

the targeting of conservative tax-exempt applicants by the 

IRS ‘‘inexcusable’’ and promised that he would ‘‘not tolerate this kind of behavior in any agency, but especially 

in the IRS, given the power that it has and the reach 

that it has into all of our lives’’; 

Whereas Barbara Bosserman, a trial attorney at the Department of Justice who in the past several years has contributed nearly $7,000 to the Democratic National Committee and political campaigns of President Obama, is 

playing a leading role in the investigation by the Department of Justice; 

Whereas the Public Integrity Section of the Department of 

Justice communicated with the IRS about the potential 

prosecution of tax-exempt applicants; 

Whereas, on December 5, 2013, President Obama declared in 

a national television interview that the targeting of conservative tax-exempt applicants by the IRS was caused by 

a ‘‘bureaucratic’’ ‘‘list’’ by employees in ‘‘an office in Cincinnati’’; 


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Whereas, on April 9, 2014, the Committee on Ways and 

Means of the House of Representatives referred Lois 

Lerner to the Department of Justice for criminal prosecution; 

Whereas the Committee on Ways and Means of the House of 

Representatives found that Lois Lerner used her position 

to improperly influence agency action against conservative tax-exempt organizations, denying these groups due 

process and equal protection rights as guaranteed by the 

United States Constitution, in apparent violation of section 242 of title 18, United States Code; 

Whereas the Committee on Ways and Means of the House of 

Representatives found that Lois Lerner targeted Crossroads Grassroots Policy Strategies while ignoring similar 

liberal-leaning tax-exempt applicants; 

Whereas the Committee on Ways and Means of the House of 

Representatives found that Lois Lerner impeded official 

investigations by knowingly providing misleading statements to TIGTA, in apparent violation of section 1001 

of title 18, United States Code; 

Whereas the Committee on Ways and Means of the House of 

Representatives found that Lois Lerner may have disclosed confidential taxpayer information, in apparent violation of section 6103 of the Internal Revenue Code of 

1986; 

Whereas former Department of Justice officials have testified 

before a subcommittee of the Committee on Oversight 

and Government Reform of the House of Representatives 

that the circumstances of the investigation by the administration of the targeting of conservative tax-exempt apVerDate Mar 15 2010 02:55 Jun 27, 2014 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00006 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6300 E:\BILLS\SR487.IS SR487

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plicants by the IRS warrant the appointment of a special 

counsel; 

Whereas Department of Justice regulations counsel attorneys 

to avoid the ‘‘appearance of a conflict of interest likely 

to affect the public perception of the integrity of the investigation or prosecution’’; 

Whereas, on January 13, 2014, unnamed officials in the Department of Justice leaked to the media that no criminal 

charges would be appropriate for IRS officials who engaged in the targeting activity, which undermined the integrity of the investigation by the Department of Justice; 

Whereas, on January 29, 2014, Attorney General Holder told 

the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, ‘‘I don’t think 

that there is a basis for us to conclude on the information as it presently exists that there is any reason for the 

appointment of the independent counsel . . . . The notion that somehow this has caused a loss of faith in this 

Justice Department is inconsistent with the facts’’; 

Whereas, on February 2, 2014, President Obama stated publicly that there was ‘‘not even a smidgen of corruption’’ 

in connection with the IRS targeting activity; 

Whereas, on April 16, 2014, e-mails between the Department 

of Justice and the IRS were released showing that the 

Department of Justice considered prosecuting conservative nonprofit groups for engaging in political activity 

that is legal under Federal law, which damaged the integrity of the Department of Justice and undermined its investigation; 

Whereas, on May 8, 2014, the IRS agreed to provide all of 

Lois Lerner’s e-mails to investigators of the Committee 

on Ways and Means of the House of Representatives; 


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Whereas, on May 14, 2014, e-mails obtained through a request under section 552 of title 5, United States Code 

(commonly known as the ‘‘Freedom of Information Act’’) 

by the nonprofit group Judicial Watch indicate that the 

Washington office of the IRS was examining applications 

for tax-exempt status by Tea Party organizations, which 

is contrary to claims that the cases were being handled 

by lower-level workers in Cincinnati; 

Whereas, on June 11, 2014, James Comey, Director of the 

Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), testified to the 

Committee on the Judiciary of the House of Representatives that FBI investigators did not examine the IRS 

database with taxpayer information, which included private taxpayer information that is prohibited from being 

shared without an order from a judge, and only looked 

at the table of contents; 

Whereas, on June 13, 2014, IRS Office of Legislative Affairs 

Director Leonard Ourlser informed the Committee on Finance of the Senate that the IRS could not produce emails from January 2009 through April 2011 from Lois 

Lerner due to a computer crash; 

Whereas, on June 17, 2014, the IRS stated that it could not 

produce e-mails from 6 other IRS employees; 

Whereas, on June 23, 2014, it was reported that Commissioner of Internal Revenue John Koskinen has contributed approximately $100,000 to Democratic candidates 

and organizations, including $7,300 to President Obama; 

Whereas, on June 24, 2014, it was reported that the IRS 

agreed to pay $50,000 in damages to one of the conservative groups, the National Organization for Marriage, as 


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a result of the unlawful release of confidential information to a political rival of that group; 

Whereas, on June 25, 2014, according to the Committee on 

Ways and Means of the House of Representatives, Lois 

Lerner sought to have Senator Chuck Grassley, a sitting 

United States Senator and ranking Republican member 

of the Committee on the Judiciary of the Senate, referred 

for IRS examination; and 

Whereas section 600.1 of title 28, Code of Federal Regulations, promulgated under section 515 of title 28, United 

States Code, requires the Attorney General to appoint a 

special counsel or prosecutor when it is determined 

that— 

(1) a criminal investigation of a person or matter is 

warranted; 

(2) investigation or prosecution of that person or 

matter by a United States Attorney’s Office or litigating 

Division of the Department of Justice would present a 

conflict of interest for the Department or other extraordinary circumstances; and 

(3) under the circumstances, it would be in the public interest to appoint an outside special counsel or prosecutor to assume responsibility for the matter: Now, 

therefore, be it 

1 Resolved, That it is the sense of the Senate that— 

2 (1) the statements and actions of the Internal 

3 Revenue Service (IRS), the Department of Justice, 

4 and the administration of President Barack Obama 

5 in connection with the targeting of conservative taxVerDate Mar 15 2010 02:55 Jun 27, 2014 Jkt 039200 PO 00000 Frm 00009 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\SR487.IS SR487

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1 exempt applicants by the IRS have served to under2 mine the investigation by the Department of Justice; 

3 (2) the efforts of the administration to under4 mine the investigation by the Department of Justice, 

5 and the appointment of Barbara Bosserman, who 

6 has donated almost $7,000 to President Obama and 

7 the Democratic National Committee, to a lead inves8 tigative role, have created a conflict of interest that 

9 warrants removal of the investigation from the nor10 mal processes of the Department of Justice; 

11 (3) further investigation of the matter is war12 ranted due to the apparent criminal activity by Lois 

13 Lerner, former Director of the Exempt Organiza14 tions Division within the Tax-Exempt and Govern15 ment Entities Division of the IRS, and the ongoing 

16 disclosure of internal communications showing po17 tentially unlawful conduct by executive branch per18 sonnel; 

19 (4) appointment of a special counsel or pros20 ecutor would be in the public interest, given the con21 flict of interest for the Department of Justice and 

22 the strong public interest in ensuring that public of23 ficials who inappropriately target individuals for ex24 ercising their right to free expression are held ac25 countable; and 


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1 (5) Attorney General Eric H. Holder, Jr. 

2 should appoint a special counsel or prosecutor, with 

3 meaningful independence, to investigate the tar4 geting of conservative nonprofit advocacy groups by 

5 the IRS. 

Æ 


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