Disgraced former Internal Revenue Service official Lois Lerner reportedly pocketed $129,300 in bonuses between 2010 and 2013 – the years she allegedly supervised a program targeting conservative nonprofits for extra scrutiny.
During her time heading the tax-exempt division that's at the center of the IRS targeting scandal, Lerner was already getting paid a handsome salary that reached $177,000 – plus a 25 per cent "retention bonus" to encourage her to stay put,
the Washington Free Beacon reports.
The bonuses averaged $43,000 a year.
Lerner was recommended for the extra dough by former acting IRS commissioner Steven Miller and Joseph Grant, the deputy commissioner of the tax-exempt division; both men would later resign in connection with the targeting scandal, the Free Beacon notes.
Citing
documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, the Free Beacon reports Miller first recommended Lerner for a $42,000 retention bonus in December 2009. In 2011 and 2012, Lerner’s retention bonuses were $43,050 and $44,250.
In November 2012, the IRS withheld the bonus because her total estimated earnings for the calendar year had exceeded the limit for federal employees: $230,700.
The agency canceled her bonus March 10, 2013.
"Nothing the IRS does surprises me," Jenny Beth Martin, co-founder of Tea Party Patriots
said in a statement to Newsmax.
"The news that Lois Lerner collected $129,000 in bonuses during the three years she was
wrecking people’s lives, however, is particularly galling.
"Millions of hardworking Americans are hurting and struggling to make ends meet.
Meanwhile, it’s buckets of cash for the woman who persecuted her president’s perceived enemies. This administration penalizes achievement and success, and rewards those who further its big-government agenda. Sad."
On May 10, 2013, Lerner admitted the IRS had singled out groups applying for tax-exempt status that had "tea party” or "patriot” in their names, according to
The Washington Post.
She retired the following September – on a full federal pension – while the IRS scandal ballooned, and she appeared to sink deeper in hot water over a trove of emails on her computer that suddenly
were declared missing.
In two appearances before Congress, Lerner has invoked the Fifth Amendment on the case, and the Justice Department has not followed up on Congress'
finding of contempt against Lerner.
© 2024 Newsmax. All rights reserved.