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IRS Seizes Rural Convenience Store Owner’s Career Savings in Another Horrible Abuse of Civil Forfeiture [+video]

May 2, 2015/16 Comments/in Featured, Video /by Ben Bullard

Photo Credit: Personal Liberty

Lyndon McLellan, a rural North Carolina convenience store owner, woke up one day to discover the IRS had seized every penny of the $107,000 in his bank account. It was all the money he had put away over the course of 13 years of assiduous, hard work.

“This is all I’ve ever done. I was raised in the store business; I’m here 12-13 hours a day, seven days a week,” he explains. “To make this kind of money selling soft drinks, cigarettes and hot dogs, somebody’s gotta work, okay? It wasn’t just handed to us. It was taken from us – but it wasn’t handed to us.”

McLellan hasn’t been accused of a crime. The IRS just seized his money. And even though the IRS announced it was changing its civil forfeiture policy in October of last year – a result of growing public outcry in opposition to the practice – it didn’t relent in McLellan’s case, which predated the announcement by a few months.

For years, McLellan had been making periodic cash deposits into his account. The federal government requires that bank customers fill out a currency transaction report to document any single deposit in excess of $10,000. But McLellan had been depositing his earnings in increments beneath that threshold – for more than a decade.

The IRS had, until its policy change last year, exercised its own discretion in invoking its power of civil asset forfeiture against these smaller depositors. The spirit of the forfeiture law, as it applies to McLellan’s case, assumes that he was sitting on a stack of currency but elected to deposit it in small increments to avoid the government’s reporting requirements. (Read more from “IRS Seizes Rural Convenience Store Owner’s Career Savings in Another Horrible Abuse of Civil Forfeiture” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

IRS Deadline Extended for ObamaCare Customers Sent the Wrong Tax Form

April 6, 2015/0 Comments/in Featured, News /by Sarah Ferris

ObamaCare customers who received the wrong tax form from the federal government this spring will not face penalties if they miss the April 15 deadline, officials announced Friday.

Anyone who have not yet been sent corrected tax forms and are “unable to file an accurate tax return” now have until Oct. 15 to file — as long as they request an extension.

The government did not say how many people will be given extra time, though officials said in late March that 80,000 people were still waiting on their corrected tax forms. A total of 800,000 people had mailed the wrong forms.

“If a taxpayer receives their Form 1095-A before April 15 and is able to file using the form before the deadline, they should do so,” according to a statement from the Treasury Department released late Friday.

The Centers for Medicare and Medicare Services (CMS), which is overseeing the rollout of ObamaCare, has acknowledged that it has taken more time than expected to mail the proper forms. (Read more from “IRS Deadline Extended for ObamaCare Customers Sent the Wrong Tax Form” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

IRS Chief to GOP: You Can’t Abolish Us [+video]

April 1, 2015/4 Comments/in Featured, Video /by Bernie Becker

The IRS commissioner on Tuesday brushed aside GOP proposals to abolish his agency, insisting the U.S. would have to have a tax collector one way or another.

“You can call them something other than the IRS if that made you feel better,” the agency’s chief, John Koskinen, said after a speech at the National Press Club.

Republicans have heaped even more criticism upon the agency than usual over the last 22 months because of its improper scrutiny of Tea Party groups.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) perhaps has made the most prominent calls to get rid of the IRS. While launching his presidential bid earlier in March, he floated the idea of “a simple flat tax that lets every American fill out his or her taxes on a postcard” . . .

Koskinen said Tuesday that, even under the simplest of tax codes, the federal government would need an agency to collect revenue and administer the tax code, something Cruz’s own aides have also admitted. (Read more from “IRS Chief to GOP: You Can’t Abolish Us [+video]” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Survey on Obamacare: Most Uninsured Choose Penalty Over Enrollment Offer Under Health Law

March 21, 2015/0 Comments/in Featured, News /by Stephanie Armour

A special enrollment period to obtain health insurance for millions of uninsured people who owe a tax penalty under the Affordable Care Act is off to a slow start.

The health law requires most Americans to have insurance or pay a fine at tax time. The open enrollment period under the health law ended Feb. 15, but the Obama administration said it would allow people who discover they owe a fine to sign up for coverage through April, at the end of the tax season.

Major tax-preparation firms say many customers are paying the penalty and not getting health insurance. It is still early, since the special enrollment period launched Sunday, but research also suggests that many people who lack health insurance will pay the penalty and not get covered this year.

Only 12% of uninsured people would buy policies if informed of the penalty, according to a survey of 3,000 adults polled through Feb. 24 by McKinsey & Co.’s Center for U.S. Health System Reform.

At H&R Block Inc., “our analysis indicates that a significant percentage of taxpayers whose household members were not covered for at least a portion of 2014 are opting” to pay the penalty, said Mark Ciaramitaro, a vice president of health-care enrollment services at the tax-preparation firm. (Read more from “Many Uninsured Choose Penalty Over Enrollment Offer Under Health Law” HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

IRS Knowingly Hired, Rehired Tax Cheats, Employees With ‘Performance’ Issues

February 6, 2015/4 Comments/in Featured, News /by News Editor

Photo Credit: Washington Times By Stephen Dinan. The IRS rehired hundreds of employees who had prior records of bad performance at the agency, including 141 former workers who had botched their own tax returns and others who had used their positions to peek at private tax information, the agency’s inspector general said in a report released Thursday.

Five IRS employees were rehired even though the agency knew they had intentionally failed to file their taxes within the last two years, Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration J. Russell George said. Of the employees with prior problems, nearly 20 percent of them had more problems after they were rehired.

In another instance, an employee who has taken eight weeks of unauthorized vacation and whose previous manager had written a note explicitly stating “do not rehire,” was nonetheless rehired.

“Rehiring prior employees with known conduct and performance issues presents increased risk to the IRS and taxpayers,” Mr. George said.

Most rehired employees don’t have any problems, and the IRS does a good job of weeding out those with criminal records or history of drug use, but the agency doesn’t give much credence to the workers’ rule-breaking during their previous stints at the IRS. (Read more about how the IRS rehired tax cheats HERE)

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IRS Took Cash, Asked Questions Later

By Robert O’ Harrow Jr. The Internal Revenue Service has routinely seized bank accounts from individuals in recent years without proof of criminal wrongdoing — and only then asked the account owners about allegations of suspicious activity.

From 2005 to 2012, the IRS took almost a quarter-billion dollars in more than 2,500 cases, using authorities under federal asset forfeiture law. That’s the finding of a new study by the Institute for Justice, a libertarian-leaning civil liberties group. The group’s study, “Seize First, Question Later,” focuses on IRS enforcement of a law that prohibits “structuring,” a type of banking activity intended to launder ill-gotten money or hide the source of funds.

Civil asset forfeiture efforts by local, state and federal authorities have come under fire in recent months. Critics across the political spectrum say that civil seizures are often unfair and an abuse of police power. (Read more from this story HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Need Help With Your New Obamacare Tax Return? IRS Won’t be There to Help

January 15, 2015/1 Comment/in Featured, News /by Stephen Ohlemacher

Filing a federal tax return is about to get more complicated for millions of families because of President Barack Obama’s health law. But they shouldn’t expect much help from the Internal Revenue Service.

Got a question for the IRS? Good luck reaching someone by phone. The tax agency says only half of the 100 million people expected to call this year will be able to reach a person.

Callers who do get through may have to wait on hold for 30 minutes or more to talk to someone who will answer only the simplest questions.

“Taxpayers who need help are not getting it, and tax compliance is likely to suffer over the longer term if these problems are not quickly and decisively addressed,” said a report Wednesday by agency watchdog Nina E. Olson.

IRS Commissioner John Koskinen says budget cuts are forcing the agency to reduce taxpayer services and other functions. The number of audits will decline, technology upgrades will be delayed and the agency might be forced to shut down and furlough workers for two days later this year, Koskinen said. (Read more about how the IRS won’t be able to help with your Obamacare tax return HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Half of Obamacare Subsidy Recipients Owe the IRS

January 4, 2015/2 Comments/in Featured, News /by News Editor

Photo Credit: (AP / Susan WalshBy Justin Green. As many as 3.4 million people who received Obamacare subsidies may owe refunds to the federal government, according to an estimate by a tax preparation firm.

H&R Block is estimating that as many as half of the 6.8 million people who received insurance premium subsidies under the Affordable Care Act benefited from subsidies that were too large, the Wall Street Journal reported Thursday.

“The ACA is going to result in more confusion for existing clients, and many taxpayers may well be very disappointed by getting less money and possibly even owing money,” the president of a tax preparation and education school told the Journal. (Read more about the Obamacare subsidy recipients HERE)

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Feds Looking for Company to Run its Obamacare Computers

By Jeryl Bier. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is looking for vendors to run its “National Data Warehouse,” a database for “capturing, aggregating, and analyzing information” related to beneficiary and customer experiences with Medicare and the federal Obamacare marketplaces. Although the database primarily consists of quality control metrics related to individuals’ interactions with customer service, potential contractors are to “[d]emonstrate … experience with scalability and security in protecting data and information with customer, person-sensitive information including Personal Health Information and Personally Identifiable information (personal health records, etc.).” Vendors are also instructed that one of the requirements of a possible future contract would be “[e]nsuring that all products developed and delivered adhere to Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) compliance standards.”

For a number of years, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), the division of HHS responsible for Medicare and now Obamacare also, has maintained a “national data warehouse” (NDW) related to the 1-800-MEDICARE helpline. The passage of the Affordable Care Act and subsequent establishment of the Marketplaces has expanded the scope of the NDW. (Read more from this story HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Congressional Report: Obama Weaponized IRS Against Conservatives

December 28, 2014/16 Comments/in Featured, News /by News Editor

Photo Credit: AFP

By Pete Kasperowicz. The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee will release a report Tuesday that finds the Obama White House has turned the IRS into a political organization that has spent years attacking conservative groups.

“The Internal Revenue Service has compromised its traditional position as an independent tax administrator,” the report found. “The IRS’s inability to keep politics out of objective decisions about interpretation of the tax code damaged its primary function: an apolitical tax collector that Americans can trust to treat them fairly”. . .

The decision to target conservative groups was followed by later decisions to cover it up, and blame lower level workers for the initiative.

The report also blamed Obamacare, which gave the IRS a key role in implementing Obama’s health program, for turning the IRS into an arm of the White House, when it should have remained independent.

“Evidence shows an IRS responsive to the partisan policy objectives of the White House and an IRS leadership that coordinates with political appointees of the Obama administration,” it found. It said efforts to cover up the scandal were ultimately led by Obama himself. (Read more about how Obama has used the IRS against conservatives HERE)
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GOP report: Top IRS official considered admitting targeting before 2012 election — but didn’t

By FoxNews.com. A top IRS official considered going public with the agency’s targeting of conservative groups at a hearing just months before the 2012 presidential election but ultimately decided against revealing the bombshell news, according to a new report from a GOP-led House committee.

Then-Deputy Commissioner Steven Miller wrote in an email in June 2012, about a month before a House Ways and Means subcommittee hearing, that he was weighing whether to testify to “put a stake” in the “c4” issue — apparently a reference to allegations about politics playing a role in the agency’s denial of tax-exempt, 501(c)(4) status to conservative-leaning groups.

“I am beginning to wonder whether I should do [the hearing] and affirmatively use it to put a stake in politics and c4,” Miller told his chief of staff, Nikole Flax, in a June 2012 email obtained by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

Miller ultimately testified at the July 25 hearing but never revealed his knowledge of the misconduct.

“Because he did not, he did a great disservice to the American taxpayers,” the House oversight committee report states. (Read more from this story HERE)

Feds Balk at Releasing Docs Showing IRS Sharing Tax Returns with White House

December 4, 2014/1 Comment/in Featured, News /by News Editor

Photo Credit: Washington Examiner

Feds Balk at Releasing Docs Showing IRS Sharing Tax Returns with White House

By Paul Bedard.

Less than a week after ’fessing up that it found some 2,500 documents potentially showing that the IRS shared taxpayer returns with the White House, the Obama administration has reversed course and won’t release the trove to a group suing for access.

In an abrupt decision, the Treasury inspector general’s office said that the documents are covered by privacy and disclosure laws and can’t be provided to Cause of Action, despite a promise last week to hand over some 2,500.

The decision coincides with publication by the Washington Examiner this week of “Watchdogs, lapdogs and attack dogs,” a four-part series examining the successes and failures of the inspectors-general system, including multiple instances in which IGs provided cover for agency managers seeking to avoid more rigorous evaluations.

Prisoners Rake In Millions from IRS in Bogus Refund Claims

November 29, 2014/2 Comments/in Featured, News /by Fox News

Photo Credit: AP

Hundreds of thousands of prisoners are filing phony tax refund claims and the IRS is not doing enough to quash the problem, according to a watchdog report.

The Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) said in its report Tuesday that refund fraud associated with prisoner Social Security numbers is a “significant problem” for the tax agency that is only getting worse over time.

According to the report, more than 137,000 phony tax returns were filed in 2012 using a prisoner’s Social Security number to the tune of $1 billion. While many of the fake refunds were flagged and prevented by the agency, the IRS issued $70 million in bogus refunds.

This was a significant increase from 2007, when more than 37,000 fake tax returns were filed for amounts equaling $166 million.

“Tax refund fraud associated with prisoners remains a significant problem for tax administration,” the report said.

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