IRS Spent Millions on Conferences, Employees Stayed in $3500 per Night Hotel Suites (+video)

The Internal Revenue Service is playing defense on a new front: excess spending on conferences.

The IRS spent close to $50 million on 225 conferences between 2010 and 2012, according to briefings given to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee by the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration.

TIGTA will release an audit Tuesday that details surplus spending at a conference in 2010 for 2,700 people in the IRS Small Business/Self-Employed division.

At a House oversight committee hearing on the issue next week, lawmakers will focus on the August 2010 conference held in Anaheim, California, at a cost of $4 million. Several IRS employees stayed in presidential suites at hotels, the committee learned. Such suites currently cost between $1,500 to $3,500 per night.

“The culture of the federal workforce is one where I don’t think you can underestimate that if you don’t keep reminding the voters – but also the federal workers – that we’re watching, this will happen again,” Rep. Darrell Issa said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

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