employees union to award over $43 million in bonuses to unionized employees. the irs also announced new bonuses for managers and executives. and this comes at a time when every agency is certainly struggling to do more with less, and we're open to that. we're sympathetic to that. and the irs is blaming the declining customer service on insufficient funding. but many americans, frankly, and i hear this in my district, i think others, as well, are surprised to hear that irs employees are unionized. they will be even more surprised at how much money is being spent on union activity. last year, as oversight chairman i looked into this question, and found that in 2012, irs employees used almost 600,000 hours of official work time on union activity and spent hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars on travel expenses for union events. so i mean, i understand that the question of why irs employees are unionized predates your confirmation. i mean, it's -- that's known. but, but can you tell us why the irs is now reversing a decision that danny wuerfel, when he was your prede

my surprise that you had changed an earlier decision in award over $43 million in bonuses to irs employee union members. this occurred at a time when the irs is constantly complaining about the scarce resources, making matters worse, the irs failed to inform the committee of the decision in advance of the announcement knowing it was a subject of concern for this committee and the subcommittee, in particular. adding insult to injury as we'll get to later, the irs continues to with hold documents requested by this committee pursuant to the ongoing investigation. commissioner, we need you to turn these documents over. the agency owes us and the off to the right start and clear the slate and get a clean slate. you can implement the reforms you want to do and restore the trust to the agency and we can carry on our oversight activities and then address some of the ongoing future problems with the irs. with that i yielde yield to the distinguished ranking member to georgia mr. lewis. >> good morning and thank you mr. chairman for holding this hearing. i am pleased to welcome john koskinen to the ways

. >> two days ago the irs announced it reached a deal with the irs employee union, the national treasury union to award $43 billion in bonuses to union newsed employees skblp it's important to see the performance awards. they will only go to probably between 50 and 65% of the employees and they allow us to settle litigation. >> his point is it would be better to pay the employees to improve morale at the irs rather than risk losing a lawsuit to the union. >> controversial. mike, thank you very much. >>> tomorrow there is another hearing on this issue. this time congress is calling witnesses including the doj's staff in charge of this investigation. she is unlikely to show up, but they are going to be will tomorrow. he's the chief legal counsel and is representing dozens of groups which say that they were target ed by the irs. many were asked who they prayed for, what books they read, they waited months and sometimes years to get their tax exemption forms put through and many of them were audited. jay, you must have been very surprised when you heard the president say that this was a done

committees in congress, that he is more concerned about the public employee union than with the committee's oversight or views. how extensive was the irs targeting? well, it can be quantified. an inspector general report says the agency gave extra scrutiny to 298 groups when they applied for tax exempt status. the white house claimed liberal groups were also targeted, indeed they were. but look at the massive imbalance between the number of liberal groups and the targeted conservative groups. 248 of those groups were conservative. 29 were liberal. 21 were, if there is such a thing, neutral. 45% of those conservative groups did ultimately win tax exempt status compared to almost 70% of the liberal groups, which have their status approved by the irs. >>> the national labor relations board sparked a new battle with business after announcing its moving forward with new rules to speed up the process for employees to form a union. the nlrb setsz the pro appoinpay it helps employees. the board approved similar rules more than two years ago but they were struck down because the nlrb wasn't staffed properly because of recess appointments, that

irs in a timely fashion. and also, we're essentially seeing that the national treasury employees union in their collective bargaining? you have to pay irs workers wages. we know that the dollar amount of the budget of the irs is up about 50% since 2001. number of tax returns filed with the irs, still up only about 6% in comparison. so they will be tracking these developments as they come in, bringing you the latest stories. back to you guys. ashley: i'm just interested, what do they get the bonuses for? the most audits or most money recovered or what? >> that is a great question. for bringing in more money. closing the tax gap. doing a good job, answering phone calls. timely -- ashley: doing their job in other words. >> that's right. and basically collecting taxes from you and i so. back to you guys. ashley: doesn't sit well a lot of people. liz macdonald, great stuff. >> sure. tracy: you need a bonus to do your own job. how about that? >>> calls on president obama for help to end the propane shortage during this winter of discontent. we have an exclusive interview ahead with indiana governor mike pence. ashley: one

union address, the president did not so much as mention the words irs. >> all irs all the time. there have been 15 congressional hearings, and 255 irs employees responding to congressional investigations. and all of those investigations have turned up nothing. no wrongdoing. so what is the price tag on the investigation of a phony scandal like this? $14 million. and that's a conservative estimate. did all these republicans think we wouldn't notice this is costing millions of dollars, but makes no sense? nice try, but we got you. (vo) you are a business pro. seeker of the sublime. you can separate runway ridiculousness... from fashion that flies off the shelves. and you...rent from national. because only national lets you choose any car in the aisle... and go. and only national is ranked highest in car rental customer satisfaction by j.d. power. (natalie) ooooh, i like your style. (vo) so do we, business pro. so do we. go national. go like a pro. it's eb. want to give your family the very best in taste, freshness, and nutrition? it's eb. want to give them more vitamins, omega 3s, and less saturated fat? it's eb. eggland's best eggs. eb's. the

irs employees who said everything is fine of course that was the conclusion. everything is fine. >> apparently collective bargaining agreement says bonuses have to be paid. the administration won't take on the union number two i assume even though there is collective bargaining agreement that gotten newses have to be deserved or there is a reward they should be based on merit. the new one is john, he is going to appear tomorrow before the ways and means committee with dave camp. i'm sure he will be asked about this $62.5 million in bonuses. lois lerner still hasn't turned over the emails that have been requested by congress. congress hasn't even finished its investigation on this tea party business. already these employees are getting bonuses and rewards. >> i know the response is going to be not everybody was involved in targeting. until they at least get to the bottom of it. some people must have known things were going on. they must know what colleagues are doing. at least until we get to the bottom of this investigation that has been so slow moving, that, you know, it seems, you know, the time something really bad. >> we have emails from d.c. telling the field officers to sit on the applicati

irs. the first issue is the agency's decision to reinstate tens of millions of dollars in bonuses postponed last year due to the sequester. the agency made a deal with employees unions of the committee on that. they turn to the main event and the issue of tax exemption for political groups like tea partiers that caused controversy last year. it heated up again after the comments over a super bowl interview on fox and he said all of it was a result of boneheaded decisions. the chairman said the ways and means had investigated and found otherwise. the president was ill-informed or being misled by staff. he made it clear the committee is not about to fold on this. they are continuing to demand the e-mails that they think are relevant. they were invited to disagree on the record with the president's assessment. six investigations into the issues have not been concluded, but he conveniently side stepped and said he would leave the conclusions to others. >> joe johns with the headlines and our senior media correspondent and host of the reliable sources. you have the conservative media led by fox news. they are not letting go of the irs and the tax status because of certai