IRS Commissioner John Koskinen visited a group of moderate House Republicans on Wednesday in an attempt to avoid impeachment at the hands of frustrated House investigators.
House Oversight and Government Reform Committee chairman Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, has accused Koskinen of defying congressional subpoenas and giving investigators false information pertaining to the agency’s inappropriate targeting of Tea Party groups. The committee, which includes some of the most aggressive members of the GOP conference, has been pushing GOP leaders to impeach Koskinen for nearly two years, and the issue is expected to come to a head next week.
Koskinen told the Tuesday Group, a caucus of the most moderate members of the House GOP, that he has been falsely accused of lying to Congress, explaining that he provided inaccurate information by mistake.
“He basically said that the information that he had at a certain hearing wasn’t the whole picture … that he was wrong in some of the things that he had testified before, but that shouldn’t be a reason to impeach him,” Rep. Tom Rooney, R-Fla., who attended the meeting, told the Washington Examiner. “You got to give the guy credit for showing up and making his case. I don’t think a lot of people would have the guts to do that.”
Rep. Ron DeSantis, R-Fla., one of Koskinen’s most vigorous critics, said that the IRS chief’s defense doesn’t hold water. “Koskinen is trying to run last minute interference, but the fact is he testified under oath that he confirmed that no backup tapes existed (false), said the IRS went to great lengths to produce all information (false), and pledged to turn over all Lois Lerner emails (the IRS destroyed 24,000 Lerner emails after Congress subpoenaed them),” DeSantis told the Examiner.
If DeSantis can persuade his Florida colleague, then Koskinen’s congressional tour might backfire. “I might actually vote to go for impeachment if I find out that what he was saying to us [in the meeting] was not true,” Rooney said. “but if he’s asking for more time to make his case, I don’t see how that’s a bad plan.”
