(FreedomBeacon.com)- On Monday, Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) accused the IRS of “government spying” on People and called for the House Oversight Committee to view the supporting papers.
An election education nonprofit that applied for tax-exempt status from the IRS under Biden faced extensive formal questioning last year, which the group claims violated its speech rights under the First Amendment in a manner reminiscent of the Lois Lerner targeting scandal during the Obama administration when the IRS singled out conservative groups for audits.
The documents show that the IRS questioned the foundation about its political stances and how it planned to prevent “inflammatory language” from entering its educational programs.
According to Phill Kline, the Biden administration’s belief that it can license thinking and expression is further shown by the IRS queries.
Representative Biggs (R-GA) of the House Oversight and Judiciary Committees said that the IRS’s role should be limited to collecting taxes and not policing political speech.
As chairman of the Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Federal Government Surveillance, Biggs said that the questions asked in the IRS interrogatory constituted government monitoring of the American people. The IRS does not have the jurisdiction to censor political speech.
Biggs says their duties include “ministerial activities,” such as collecting taxes and tax returns. Their duty does not include policing your right to free expression or deciding whether or not your dissemination of false material violates the law.
That’s overstepping their bounds even on the most expansive reading of the 16th Amendment. Biggs thinks the Oversight Committee is the best way to handle this problem.
This has happened before; the federal government of the United States has a history of bureaucratic “weaponization.” Biggs said this comes as no surprise; however, he was somewhat perplexed as to why we haven’t heard from the IRS sooner, given that they are now recruiting 87,000 more agents.
Kline pointed out that the government’s actions are eerily consistent with President Joe Biden’s September “red speech” in Philadelphia, in which he claimed President Donald Trump and the “Make America Great Again” Republicans represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our Republic.
Kline criticized Biden’s statements, arguing that government monitoring of political discourse is more dangerous to democracy than the so-called threat the president has been warning about.
