{"id":1709887,"date":"2022-10-25T08:12:14","date_gmt":"2022-10-25T12:12:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1709887"},"modified":"2022-10-25T08:21:26","modified_gmt":"2022-10-25T12:21:26","slug":"gop-mobilizes-for-new-war-on-the-irs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/gop-mobilizes-for-new-war-on-the-irs\/","title":{"rendered":"GOP Mobilizes for New War on the IRS"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">16<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fgop-mobilizes-for-new-war-on-the-irs%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1709887&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/25082122\/90-103\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" alt=\"image\" \/><\/div>\n<div class=\"RichTextArticleBody\">\n<div class=\"RichTextArticleBody-body\">\n<div class=\"Enhancement\">\n<div class=\"Enhancement-item\"><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><span class=\"ArticlePage-articleBody-firstLetter\">R<\/span>epublicans are mobilizing for an escalating and prolonged battle against the <a class=\"Link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/irs\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">IRS<\/a> and its Democratic-backed plans to hire tens of thousands of more employees with money from the climate and health bill signed by President Joe Biden. <\/p>\n<p>The GOP hopes to use public skepticism of added funding for the tax agency <a class=\"Link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/midterms\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">to win back<\/a> the House and even the Senate. From there, the party hopes to use control of congressional committees to investigate and oversee the IRS. Then, it is plotting legislation to defund it or rein it in. While opportunities to enact such measures will be limited while Biden is in office, Republicans are planning for legislation in 2025 \u2014 and sound open to the possibility of risking a government shutdown as leverage to extract reforms in the meantime. <\/p>\n<p><b><a class=\"Link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/news\/white-house\/irs-overhaul-failure-biden-commissioner\">BIDEN RISKS \u2018FAILURE\u2019 ON BEEFING UP IRS FOR ONE BIG REASON, FORMER CHIEFS SAY<\/a><\/b> <\/p>\n<p>Although the Republican Party has been hostile to the IRS for decades, the party&#8217;s emphasis on reform has taken on new life in recent months for two reasons. <\/p>\n<p>The first is the <a class=\"Link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/policy\/economy\/republicans-irs-funding-attack-manchin-legislation\">$80 billion influx of funding to the IRS<\/a>, which, according to a 2021 Treasury report, could translate to 87,000 new employees over a decade. The funding was approved as a revenue raiser in the partisan Inflation Reduction Act. The second is the still-unexplained leak <a class=\"Link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/news\/tax-leak-biden-blow-republican-support-irs-funding\">last year<\/a> of the tax returns of thousands of the nation\u2019s wealthiest people. <\/p>\n<p>During the Trump years, relations between the GOP and the IRS had been thawing following controversy over the scandal regarding the agency&#8217;s acknowledgment that it had targeted Tea Party groups for extra scrutiny. Funding for the agency modestly increased in 2020 and 2021 following years of cuts after Trump Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin lobbied to give it more money. And in 2019, President Donald Trump signed bipartisan reforms <a class=\"Link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.irs.gov\/taxpayer-first-act\">into law<\/a>. <\/p>\n<p>But now the GOP is more focused than ever on reining in the IRS. <\/p>\n<p>House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy of California, poised to be speaker of the House if Republicans win in November, said in September that reversing Democrats\u2019 efforts to fund the IRS would be the No. 1 priority for his party. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cOn that very first day that we\u2019re sworn in, you\u2019ll see that it all changes,\u201d the California Republican said at an event. \u201cBecause on our very first bill, we\u2019re going to repeal 87,000 IRS agents. Our job is to work for you, not go after you. Our job is to make America stronger.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>The issue has been a salient one with voters in the lead-up to the midterm elections. Of all the provisions included in the Democratic climate and health bill, the IRS funding has been used to attack the administration the most and appears to do well \u2014 at least given the amount of money that has poured into the line of attack. <\/p>\n<p>An AdImpact analysis from early this month found that, since the start of August, GOP groups and candidates have spent more than <a class=\"Link\" href=\"https:\/\/punchbowl.news\/archive\/1052022-punchbowl-news-am\/\">$12 million<\/a> on the airing of about 24,000 ads warning about the mass hiring of IRS employees, according to <i>Punchbowl News<\/i>. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn Washington, Kelly\u2019s gone kind of soft,\u201d blared a National Republican Senatorial Committee attack ad against Sen. Mark Kelly (D-AZ). \u201cHe went along with nearly $300 billion less in Medicare spending for seniors \u2026 87,000 IRS workers, enough to fill Sun Devil Stadium.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>(It is worth noting that the IRS has pushed back on the characterization that it is simply adding 87,000 more workers, given that it expects more than half of its 80,000 employees to retire over the next five years.) <\/p>\n<p>All three Republicans vying for the open top spot on the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee \u2014 Vern Buchanan of Florida, Adrian Smith of Nebraska, and Jason Smith of Missouri \u2014 told the <i>Washington Examiner<\/i> that they would plan aggressive oversight over the IRS. <\/p>\n<p>The IRS funding proposal is the only section of the legislation of which more voters disapprove than approve, according to a <i>Politico<\/i>-Morning Consult survey. All three candidates said it is an issue that resonates with voters and has generated concern. <\/p>\n<p>&#8220;The first thing is we\u2019ve got to get over and do our work, and that means having some hearings and really figuring out exactly where these 87,000 agents are going and where all the money is going from that standpoint,\u201d Buchanan said of Republicans taking control of the House. <\/p>\n<p>Adrian Smith has already introduced legislation to defund the Biden administration\u2019s plan to beef up the IRS workforce. <\/p>\n<p>All three running for the chairmanship declined to rule out blocking government funding, as has been done during budget battles in the past, in order to claw back the IRS funding and hiring, although none committed to such a tactic. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cLet me tell you \u2014 we\u2019re going to have to look at ways to be effective, and I\u2019m not going to box myself in on anything,\u201d Jason Smith said, \u201cbut we need to defund this $80 billion. How we do it, I\u2019ll leave it up to leadership to decide what\u2019s best with that, but the American people want this $80 billion eliminated and defunded.\u201d <\/p>\n<p>Alex Conant, a GOP strategist and a partner at Firehouse Strategies, said IRS funding could be the subject of high-stakes negotiating over legislation that must pass \u2014 such as bills keeping the government open or a measure to raise the federal debt ceiling. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cNobody likes the IRS, and so politically, it\u2019s just going to be very difficult for the Biden administration to draw a line in the sand on IRS funding,\u201d Conant told the <i>Washington Examiner<\/i>. <\/p>\n<p>Jason Roe, a veteran Republican consultant, told the <i>Washington Examiner<\/i> a Republican majority would prioritize rolling back Biden&#8217;s IRS initiatives. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cGoing back to the symbolism of the IRS to conservatives, to me, I think the IRS could be the first target of oversight when the new Congress is sworn in in January,\u201d Roe said. <\/p>\n<p>The war against the IRS will go deeper than just funding. <\/p>\n<p>Hearings into the leaks of tax records and other issues \u2014 for instance, the finding that the IRS <a class=\"Link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.cnbc.com\/2022\/05\/12\/tax-pros-horrified-by-irs-decision-to-destroy-data-on-30-million-filers.html\">destroyed data<\/a> for some 30 million paper-filed information return documents \u2014 should be expected. <\/p>\n<p>The GOP should use oversight hearings to draw a contrast for voters wondering why the same questions weren\u2019t asked while Democrats were in power, said Grover Norquist, the head of the anti-tax group Americans for Tax Reform. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think they\u2019re terribly vulnerable,\u201d Norquist said of the IRS. \u201cWe know scandals exist; we know the Democrats didn\u2019t look into it.\u201d <\/p>\n<p><b><a class=\"Link\" href=\"https:\/\/washingtonexaminer.com\/\">CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER<\/a><\/b> <\/p>\n<p>He said the Republicans could hold appropriations to the IRS hostage until it conducts hearings, and if some individuals won\u2019t testify, they could vow not to give the agency a penny more until lawmakers get answers to their questions. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhy would you give them $80 billion when there are these unanswered questions of corruption?\u201d Norquist said.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Republicans are mobilizing for an escalating and prolonged battle against the IRS and its Democratic-backed plans to hire tens of thousands of more employees<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1709894,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[547],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1709887","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-bongino-report"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1709887","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1709887"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1709887\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1709894"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1709887"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1709887"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1709887"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}