boustany hoc -- mr. boustany: how much time remains? the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman has 3 1/2 minute the gentleman from new york has two minutes. mr. boustany: i yield two minutes to the gentleman from louisiana. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. scalise: mr. speaker, we should not stand by and let the i.r.s. target american citizens based on their political beliefs. yet that's what's been going on. it's been uncovered. the president tries to act like it's some isolated incident and yet of course we've got all kinds of testimony that shows that this goes way beyond some local office, this is a widespread, abuse of power by the internal revenue service and what we're seeing now with this latest proposal is literally something that would try to shut down an entire seg. of american people who want to participate in the democratic process, mr. speaker. the i.r.s. should not be able to go and target people based on their political views. that's what's happening and president obama is encouraging this kind of a

i want to follow up on two things that you answered questions with chairman boustany. in one you said there were six ongoing investigations. was i correct in what i heard that there are six investigations? >> that's my understanding, that there is a on investigation going on by the senate finance committee, the permanent subcommittee on investigations, this committee of the house oversight committee, the justice department, and the fbi, and the inspector general. and i think that adds up to 6. >> and at this point in time, none of these investigations have offered a report, have completed a report, is that correct? >> that's correct. >> that you're aware of. >> okay. i'm not aware of any of those, either. and i thank you for chronicling those investigations. the other thing that i thought i heard you say but i wanted to clear fie that, as well is you said they are evaluating 501 cs, or is that just the 501(c)4 that's being looked at right now for potential changes in regulation? >> when the draft regulations were prepared before my hearing the request for comments, inc

what is your -- >> i'm not expressing an opinion on chairman camp's view or chairman boustany's view. >> what about the president's view? >> whatever comments anybody is making are their business and it's up to them. i'm not going to go around, second guessing comment business anyone. >> okay. so, do you believe that the investigations are not complete so, therefore, there's no way to come to a conclusion as your role as commissioner of the irs whether or not there's evidence of corruption in the agency? >> i'm not coming to conclusions. what anyone else wants to do is up to them. >> that shows an open mind to get to the facts, get to the investigation and get to the conclusion. i wanted to talk to you from an operational point of view. you do have some needs there that you clearly have referenced in the understaffing issue and funding issue. how have you judged that there is an understaffing issue in the agency from your point of view? you've heard from the front line employees. i get that. we've heard the same type of confidence. what metrics will you employ to deal with the fact th

and then i have tremendous respect for the subcommittee chairman doctor boustany and i appreciate the hearing being called this morning. but let me just -- this is an open investigation. leading to ineffective there have been no conclusions made as of yet, but i have to read from the chairman's opening statement and i quote last weekend the president claimed that there was not, quote come even a little corruption, en "-end-double-quo, at the irs and he blamed the targeting on, quote, boneheaded decisions by the local office. and again further quoting the chairman. the committee has actually investigated the matter and found otherwise those two statements don't necessarily jive. i would suspect it isn't necessarily an attempt to find the smoking gun. 500,000, the numbers that are congressional committees without any indication of political motivation. 60. the number of interviews conducted by the congressional committees in the current and former irs employees. 14. the number of congressional hearings where the irs personnel have answered questions regarding the investigation. 5,500. t