Congressman Aaron Schock says a high ranking IRS official should be prosecuted for misusing her position to target TEA Party based not for profit groups who filed as social welfare organizations. Lois Lerner headed the division in charge of making decisions on tax exempt status.
Schock voted with the House Ways and Means Committee party line decision to forward the results of an investigation of Lerner to Attorney General Eric Holder. Later this week, another Committee could hold Lerner in Contempt of Congress for asserting her fifth amendment right to refuse to testify, though Schock stops short of saying he agrees with a contempt decision:
“There’s some question about whether or not she correctly requested her Fifth Amendment rights. So there are those who think that she should not have been allowed to make her opening statement and basically lay her case out, and then plead the fifth. Either plea the fifth and remain silent or speak and be willing to answer questions,” Schock says.
It would be the first time since the McCarthy era that Congress has prosecuted someone for refusing to testify. Speaking to reporters on a conference call, Schock said it is clear that White House assertions are wrong that the targeting of TEA party groups went no higher than a bunch of rogue IRS agents in an Ohio office. But, he says without Lerner's testimony of who was pressuring her to investigate groups, it's not possible to say where an investigation would lead.