IRS Revokes North Carolina NAACP’s Tax-Exempt Status

The tax-exempt status of the influential North Carolina branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) was automatically revoked by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) after the non-profit group failed to file required returns with the tax agency for three consecutive years.

The loss of status by the North Carolina State Conference of the NAACP took place May 15 but did not become public knowledge until the Raleigh-based News & Observer reported on it days ago. The state chapter is known nationally for suing over voter ID requirements, which it claims disenfranchise minorities and poor people.

The Tar Heel state chapter lost a case at the U.S. Supreme Court on June 23 when the justices ruled 8-1 that the state’s Republican-controlled Legislature must be allowed to step in to advocate for a heavily litigated voter ID law in court because Josh Stein, the state’s Democratic attorney general, allegedly wasn’t doing enough to defend the statute.

But the chapter won a major legal victory on Aug. 19 when the Supreme Court of North Carolina ruled that enough electoral districts of the Republican-dominated General Assembly were so racially gerrymandered that the lawmakers may have lacked authority to move two state constitutional amendments forward. One of the amendments would have required that voters present photo identification to vote in person and the other would have lowered the maximum state income tax rate, as The Epoch Times reported. The litigation is still in progress.

The status revocation by the IRS does not prevent the NAACP chapter from operating, but it is likely to make it harder for it to raise money and could burden it financially if it has to pay taxes and fines.

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, a civil rights organization, was founded at the national level in