April 30, 1998

The IRS is out of control. The Senate bill makes the IRS more accountable to taxpayers. This goal is too important for partisan politics or extraneous amendments. This bill is part of our continuing effort to change the Washington tax culture.

• The IRS is out of control. This week's Senate Finance Committee hearings have again demonstrated to the American public how important it is that we pass this bill, and then continue to monitor this powerful agency.

• We heard how the agency uses investigative techniques -- usually reserved for violent and dangerous criminals -- against average taxpayers. We heard stories from taxpayers who experienced armed raids of their homes and businesses -- which later proved to be unwarranted and the taxpayers were fully cleared of any wrongdoing --based on the flimsiest of evidence.

Example: John Colaprete, owner of a restaurant in Virginia Beach, testified that IRS agents raided his business and home after a bookkeeper, whom he had discovered embezzling, went to the IRS and told agents a lurid tale of drug dealing and gunrunning. Colaprete was not charged with any crimes and after four months of scrutinizing records, the IRS returned most of them in a rental truck by dumping the items on the street in front of his business.

• We have uncovered the use of quotas and statistics used as performance standards for advancement in the agency, pitting IRS employees against taxpayers in adversarial and potentially destructive confrontations.

Example: An agent testified last fall that, "abuses by the IRS...are indicative of a pervasive disregard of law and regulations designed to achieve production goals for either management or the individual agent." (9/25/97 - Witness #3)

• We have uncovered how the IRS harasses and retaliates against its own employees while misbehaving bosses are protected and even promoted.

Example: A Treasury deputy assistant inspector general who was promoted to IRS national director of equal employment opportunity and diversity -- yet this was while he had several sexual harassment complaints outstanding against him. He then was the subject of more complaints, and ultimately was given a letter of reprimand and reassigned without demotion.

• Our agenda is simple. We must ensure that the IRS serves the American people, not the other way around.

• Next week, we intend to do just that. The Senate will consider legislation to reform and restructure the IRS' management to make the agency more service-oriented. It will also end, once and for all, the IRS' reckless disregard of taxpayer rights and the harassment of its own employees.

• Some critics claim that Republicans are trying to "intimidate the IRS like the IRS has intimidated taxpayers," or that the IRS hearings were "staged." -- Which hearing should have been canceled? What taxpayer's story shouldn't have been told? What reform shouldn't have been made?

• IRS reform legislation must remain above partisan politics. Everyone should work together to pass this bill and not attempt to add "poison pills" which threaten its passage.

• This legislation is the second step in our three-step process to fundamentally change the Washington tax culture:

Reduce the collection -- cutting middle-class taxes. Reform the collector -- reining in the IRS. Replace the complexity -- overhauling the tax code.

• These are NOT one-time solutions, but continuing steps to reduce the tax burden on America's taxpayers.

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