Congressman Paul Ryan spoke for most of America when he pointblank told IRS Commissioner John Koskinen, “I don’t believe you.”
Commissioner Koskinen has been defensive, defiant, dismissive, and what even Democrats are calling “arrogant” in his blind defense of the IRS targeting of conservative Americans.
While constantly contradicting himself in his testimony on Capitol Hill about Lois Lerner’s “lost” emails, Commissioner Koskinen has been entirely dismissive of the entire investigation. Most of his answers were trite quips, like when he said he used to be a practicing attorney but gave it up for lent 45 years ago in answer to a serious question about criminal wrongdoing.
Koskinen, as we were assured by the Obama Administration, was supposed to investigate, turn around, and clean up the IRS, but is turning out to be nothing more than a partisan hack at the head of an abusive agency.
Now there are reports that Koskinen has given about $100,000 dollars to Democrat political campaigns. As the Washington Free Beacon breaks down:
Koskinen has been contributing to Democrats for four decades, starting with a $1000 contribution to Democratic candidate for Colorado Senate candidate Gary Hart in 1979.
Koskinen has been a reliable donor over the years, contributing a total of $19,000 to the Democratic National Committee from 1988 to 2008. He has made a contribution to the Democratic candidate for president in each election since 1980, including $2,300 to Obama in 2008, and $5000 to Obama in 2012.
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has received $3,000 from Koskinen since 2008, and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee received $2,000 from 2004 to 2006.
With a nearly maxed out Obama donor supposedly running the DOJ investigation of the IRS and a longtime loyal Democrat partisan running the IRS itself, Chicago politics is playing out on full display at the expense of the American people.
It could not be more clear what Commissioner Koskinen’s true intentions are in this investigation into the targeting of Americans, than when he repeatedly questioned Members of Congress on what they were going to do with the information gained from their investigation of IRS abuse. When he was asked about Lois Lerner’s “lost” emails and why he never told Congress about the problem, he repeatedly demanded, “What did you do with that information?”
He cares more about how Congress is conducting its investigation of wrongdoing than his own agency’s wrongdoing – wrongdoing for which he doesn’t think “an apology is owed” to the American people.
Commissioner Koskinen is looking more like a Chicago politics consigliere, doing the Democrats’ dirty work to cover-up the massive wrongdoing and abuse at the IRS each and every day.
Like I, along with ACLJ Executive Director Jordan Sekulow, recently wrote in the Washington Times: The Obama Administration’s investigatory credibility, like Lois Lerner’s emails, has been irrevocably “lost.”
Matthew Clark is Associate Counsel for Government Affairs and Media Advocacy with the ACLJ. A lifelong citizen of the Commonwealth of Virginia, he lives with his wife and three boys in Northern Virginia. Follow Matthew Clark: @_MatthewClark.
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