Fellow Conservative,
It is official. The House Judiciary Committee has scheduled impeachment hearings!
It has taken an entire year, but patriots like you never relented and now the committee is holding impeachment hearings against IRS Commissioner John Koskinen!
This is the Obama administration official who openly lied to Congress about Lois Lerner’s hard drives.
Now, I know what you’re thinking: Can Congress even impeach the head of the IRS?
The answer is yes.
Essentially, Congress has the power to impeach any governmental position that they themselves confirmed. That includes judges and it includes cabinet members. This hasn’t happened since 1876 when Congress impeached then-Secretary of War William Belknap for corruption, but Congress still has this power.
Why impeach the IRS Commissioner? Well, Mr. Koskinen has repeatedly lied under oath surrounding his department’s handling of Lois Lerner’s emails. Despite being under congressionally imposed preservation orders, Mr. Koskinen’s department destroyed the back-ups for Lois Lerner’s emails.
What Congress gave to the IRS had all the powers of a court order. They were ordered to preserve all documents. Instead, they deliberately destroyed Lois Lerner’s back-up hard-drives and then the IRS Commissioner lied to Congress about it.
In law, what the IRS did is known as “spoliation of evidence.” By definition, the spoliation of evidence is the intentional, reckless, or negligent withholding, hiding, altering, or destroying of evidence relevant to a legal proceeding. If someone violates this order and destroys evidence, then it becomes assumed that they were guilty. Otherwise, people would just destroy evidence in order to get off.
When Congress notified the IRS that it was under investigation, the tax agency had the legal obligation to safeguard all emails, data, and documents. That’s what a preservation order means. They didn’t do that.
The IRS destroyed 422 back-up hard drives containing Lois Lerner emails knowing full well that they had a legal obligation to safeguard this data. They didn’t just wipe the hard drives clean; they physically incinerated them.
Three weeks later, John Koskinen testified before Congress that everything was going smoothly and that the committee would get all of its requested documents. But this was a lie because the IRS Commissioner was already briefed that the tapes had been deleted and physically destroyed.
Whether the IRS destroyed these back-up hard drives deliberately or ignorantly is irrelevant. By destroying the evidence, the burden of proof completely shifts. Instead of the presumption of innocence, the IRS is now presumed to be guilty.
It doesn’t matter what the excuse is. The IRS destroyed evidence after being instructed to safeguard it. On top of that, the IRS Director lied about it under oath to Congress.
The only option is impeachment.
“Commissioner Koskinen violated the public trust,” Rep Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) announced when the Articles of Impeachment were first drawn up. “He failed to comply with a congressionally issues subpoena, documents were destroyed on his watch, and the public was consistently misled.”
“Impeachment is the appropriate tool to restore public confidence in the IRS and to protect the institutional interests of Congress,” Chaffetz continued.
This is the chance to send a clear message and ensure that the history books remember the Obama administration for what it is: criminal.
We start by impeaching every one of these corrupt and criminal cabinet members and then work our way up to Barack Obama himself.
What has taken place in this administration is nothing short of a cover-up of what took place in the IRS. Even Richard Nixon knew better than to destroy the tapes. But that is exactly what the IRS has deliberately done and it’s time to start holding these lying bureaucrats accountable!
This hearing has been a year in the making. With your help, we sent Congress well over 100,000 faxes on this issue. We can’t let up now! It’s time to take this across the finish line and impeach this corrupt Obama administration official!
Sincerely,
Joe Otto
Conservative Daily
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