have you seen any evidence that anyone outside of that cincinnati office and you're in cincinnati today any kind of direction, political direction to the office? >> look, george, we just don't know. we do know that there was a california office involved. the washington office was very involved. so, it wasn't just the cincinnati office. i find it hard to believe that low-level employees here in ohio took it on themselves. and it went on for a couple of years without anyone knowing about it. we have information base on the the report, the deputy commissioner of the irs was made aware of this, at least on may 3rd. he asked his folks to go to cincinnati to look into it on march 2012. so, it seems to me that there's a lot of issues here. we need to get bottom. we need to find out what really happened and regain trust in our government. that's my concern. >> senator menendez, a call for a special counsel, do you think that's necessary? >> look, even the chairman of the house oversight committee said you don't start accusing the irs until you have an independent deep dive. that's what the insp

what's happening in cincinnati what's happening in cincinnati, and unfortunately, in other places inountry, including california and washington, d.c., there was a bias. so, we can complain about what the law says. this issue is about the enforcement of that law, the american people deserve to know that it's not being biased. that it's even-handed. that it's fair. in regards to tax contribution. by the way, earlier we heard some discussion from dan pfeiffer about whether the irs is the appropriate body now to look into obama care, and he didn't sound very confident. he said we'll have to look into that. to the point you made earlier about dan balz's article in the washington post, big government was promised to deal with these issues to solve our problems, i think that's also being brought into question. >> do you believe it's appropriate for sarah hall ingram now overseeing the president's health care plan to remain in that position? >> well, we don't know enough yet. she apparently was at the tax-exempt office heading it up until 2012. the period in which this biased target targeted

you really got into the bowels of that place in cincinnati. doesn't get how something this screwed up could happen as mr. owens was talking about, where people flag organizations that have the name tea party. >> i'm going to say up front what i don't know and we all don't know. which manager and which specialist set into motion that search for tea party groups and why they did it. i think those are the key unanswered questions out of cincinnati. what we to know, this is a mixture of interviews and the report from the ig, this was a unit that had incredible turnover. they had more managers than, you know, spinal tap had drummers. they constantly had turnover of specialist. they were moving responsibility for these cases from one group to another. it is complicated stuff as marcus was saying. it's not really very easy to say with finality, this group is doing too much politics. and they have to consult with lawyers back in washington to get real close advice on the tax rules. it's not an easy process. they screwed it up. >> i hate to call it a h

but a veteran lawyer told us today that this problem was not limited to cincinnati, that her clients who were also targeted received letters as well from california and even from washington, d.c. now, the attorney general has tried to take the initiative by promising congress a nationwide investigation to see if employees broke the law. >> is your investigation going to go beyond cincinnati, beyond ohio? is it going to be a national investigation? >> yes, it would. the facts will take us wherever they take us. it will not be only one city. we'll go wherever the facts lead us. this is something that we will base -- at least at the beginning stages we are basing it in washington. and that way i think we can have a better impact nationwide. >> brian, at last count we have four congressional investigations. >> lisa, we keep hearing cincinnati in connection with the irs. correct me if i'm wrong. that is because if you apply for tax-free status, the mail you send to the irs, that application goes to their cincinnati office, correct? >> you're absolutely correct. in fact, that is the main o

he had been involved in a cincinnati tea party. as a spokesman, but he said he had not worked with the libertytownship tea party. quote, the obvious question that comes to mind are, why am i being targeted amongst all the others? why where does this information go in the end? clearly it is housed in the irs but does it get shared with other government agencies? do i get an audit? if i do, is it against my business? all of those things go through your mind. now, to this day he doesn't know why his name is question question number 26 for an organization who still hasn't received approval since january of 2010. now the article goes on to say, democratic governor ted strickland, ohio, former governor of ohio, his top aides, who i know, very political, filed for tax-exempt status as a 501(c)(3) organization in august of 2011. they were approved nine months later. mr. miller, another organization, in ohio, the ohio liberty coalition. this is their part of their documents in response to irs requests. this is only part of it. and this, all

employees in cincinnati abused this trust. the treasury and inspector general's report found employees target groups with names containing "tea party," and "patriot." inspector general's report found that the tax-exempt unit was a bureaucratic mess. employees were ignorant about tax laws and defiant with supervisors and blind to impropriety. this is unacceptable. but inspector general's report raises many unanswered questions. the report examined 298 applications. the cincinnati office identified some of those applications using screening terms. what was the nature of the other 202 applications? are they filed by liberal groups or moderate groups? we cannot measure the full impact without knowing the nature of these additional applications. who is responsible? we know officials tried to stop this behavior. who in cincinnati perpetuated his behavior? one person, two persons? we do not know. we have launched an investigation. we've requested additional documents as part of our inquiry. we'll follow the facts and see where they t

>> for the most part located in cincinnati. there are about 140 folks who do this sort of work in cincinnati. there were a handful of people around the country that report in to cincinnati as well. >> in 2011 the report finds that the director of exempt organizations on this chart, imafraid it's not on the screen yet. this as ms. lerner's position became aware of the inappropriate criteria, she ordered the criteria changed and it was changed in 2011 to no longer refer to by name tea party or patriot. mr. george is that correct? >> that is correct, sir. >> mr. miller, as then deputy were you aware of the problem with the criteria in june and july of 2011? >> i was not, sir. >> in january, 2012, the criteria were changed again to, and i quote, organizations involved in limiting expanding government, educating on the constitution and the bill of rights, and social economic reform movement. the ig's report indicates that this change was again made in the cincinnati determinations office without executive approval. mr. george, is th

we're talking about people in cincinnati, ohio. >> cincinnati was tasked with this nationally. they had the -- you can't pigeon hole it in cincinnati. this was the national effort to go through the review of these organizations. this is where it was tasked. one place. cincinnati. you can't say it's a local operation somewhere. go ahead. >> these were low-level staffers in cincinnati. i think that the problem here is the attempt to immediately go from that to the white house. and say, well you know what -- >> i'm not doing that. >> not you. >> let me ask you a question. lois lerner, who looks at these non-profits, knew about this a year before. according to the record now. you knew about this a year before they were denying it was happening. why didn't she fire the people who did it? why weren't steps taken to seriously discipline those who had done it? i'm concerned people weren't taking responsibility on behalf of this republic within our government, not being responsible to the organization of the irs, but being responsible to the country. that's the question. >> first of all

first a couple of rogue agents in cincinnati.t least five office o the grounds were involve in the active the and probably more and then told it was junior level people and then find out it goes all the way to the the top of the division with lois lerner who shows up and pleads the fist. says something when the head of the unit refuses to come clean congress. >> sean: did you notice what i notice today, jay carney has the presser and he says go ask the justice tnk of that? >> well, look, i love the news -- the press briefing today. well, first, on the questionf the irs. do you think that thembers of the irs testifying before congress have given a satisfactory information? they have been responsiveto congress? and carney says yeah, ihink that. and then on holder, i mean i he was asking t question well, holder said this on the 15th that he didn't have anything to do with this a we now know that he did. he had two lines defense. he said you are making a mistake conflating sub pee he that with prosecution. he is saying ignore the pos

want to cincinnati during this 2012 timeframe. >> do you take responsibly for what happened in the cincinnati office? >> do i take responsibility for the last? >> yes. >> being done? i to take personal responsibility for their being a list with criteria put on it. but i do accept the fact that this did happen on my watch. >> so you don't take responsibility but you recognize the fact that it happened under your watch? >> i recognize that this happened on my watch, and i'm very sorry that this happened while i was at the internal revenue service. >> one of the problems we have here is people are unwilling to take responsibility for actions that happened under the command. and yo judy duty as far as i'm concerned to find out what was going on in the cincinnati office when members of congress, 132 of them, or 50 of them, or 10 of them informed you that they think that there's some kind of targeting going on. and if that doesn't elevate your concern and interest, there's something fundamentally wrong between the way congress interacts with the administration and the bureaucracy. now, mr. george,

people in cincinnati. staff in cincinnati.seemed to even shy away from the reference to two people, again, who have not been named. miller already said the two employees had been disciplined. no word on what that constitutes so far. when you listen to the testimony today a lot of folks are thinking that the idea that you could be just disciplined without some kind of criminal action being taken would not be sufficient. we are continuing to look into all of those areas. but the claim that only two people managed to target the 298 groups at least some of the estimates are as many as 500 groups around the country were targeted that that happened with two people who had no super vision is highly unlikely. >> greta: even the mere fact that two were disciplined shows the higher ups were well aware of it if they already sort of disciplined them. curious that people are being disciplined even before recently. anyway, thank you very much, ben. >> grow you got it. thank you, greta. >> the irs, benghazi, the justice department secret sei

and instead of the audit focusing on things like the accounting for the cincinnati tea party.you been doing, let's look at your books, it was instead entirely focused on us personally. we had to provide copies of every single deposit into our personal accounts, every single deposit and transaction for my wife's business account. entirely focused on us as individuals, and the lady was almost apologetic about -- you're being targeted because you're with the cincinnati tea party. have not revealed her name because she might show up for one of our meetings. she seemed to be on our side. but she was being forced to do something. >> neil: what i wonder and -- you're telling me this on the record but many other individuals i talked to off the record who have been saying much the same, it went beyond just conservative groups who -- conservative individuals or noted individual critics of the white house, so that this thing might be far bigger than it appears. way too early to tell. what is your hunch on this? >> i suspect there's going to be a whole new wave of this focused on the fact

cincinnati office better than bonnie esrig. so 24 years in cincinnati at the i.r.s. office?> uh-huh. >> reporter: she retired from her job as a senior manager in january. do you recall there being a lot of discussion of politics? >> no, absolutely not. politics and religion were things that people generally didn't talk about at work. >> reporter: esrig didn't work on political cases and was not connected to the applications at the center of this controversy. but she worked in the same office where fewer than 200 people were dealing with 73,000 applications for exemptions last year. she said there was little guidance on how to differentiate between so-called social welfare groups that deserved exemptions and political advocacy groups that did not. is it safe to say that you were swamped? >> absolutely. there was an awful lot of confusion during that time, both at the local level... in cincinnati and, i think, in headquarters. >> reporter: she said the agents searched for short cuts to identify groups seeking for exemptions. >> it was looking for patterns. there are variables

all of which are processed in cincinnati. beforee not one inquiry testifying before congress about what the truth of that is. a truth that now is not truth whatsoever. that is troubling. iq, mr. chairman. thank you, mr. chairman. >> unmade 10, of 2013, staff sent the following. quotes.a portion in " the fact that this information is now public and we have not been briefed despite my repeated requests over the many months is completely acceptable. that was from my committee staff based on the release by the irs. .f your audit information your response was and it is one of your staff on may 10. the irs issued a press statement without our knowledge, consent, or even advance notice. are you familiar with this exchange? >> i am not. >> is a correct, though, that the irs issued a press statement without our knowledge, consent, or advance notice? >> i want to make sure we have the dates. if this is the event in which ms. lerner gave a speech and responded to a question. >> a planted question, we now know. she planted a question tha

and cincinnati. they keep saying it's not washington, it cincinnati. what difference is it where they're doing the operation? zit not goi >> it's not going to make any difference. the irs, government targeting of conservative groups by the barack obama administration. it creates a narrative, an impression of people -- >> it's not an impression, it information. >> i know, but the irs, if there's any agency that is fueling, you know, public cynicism and skepticism, doing certainly like this -- >> richard, you're excellent at imagery and you understand this thing. we're talking about the federal government, we're talking about the irs, we're talking about taxes, which every republican, most americans don't like to begin with, the irs, which is the bugaboo of all right-wing conversations and then you have somebody targeting them. if we get information that they're targeting the brookings institution or americans for democratic action, they'd be clean. but so far no information it going across the center, it's only the right that's been targeted. >> it's on

>> we know it had to go up the chain in cincinnati at this office but there are reports that some of this was getting bounced back to washington for secondary review. >> paul: kim, what about the white house response to this. the basic point is, we didn't want to interfere with an investigation so we took hands off. nobody told the president. president didn't need to know. does that pass to the kred battle test? >> no. this week was all about the white house shifting stories who knew what and when. increasingly the press and congress is saying, it's what you knew and didn't do over the past two years. reality is if you have a president and a campaign team that themselves back in 2008 were often as a campaign were targeting conservatives, there was no knowledge or understanding about what could be happening in the irs given all these reports that were bubbling up and congress was looking into it seems harder and harder to believe. it's also hard to understand the white house's strange proposition they could not get involved in this in any way because the inspector general. >> paul: i

you set the technical adviser to cincinnati. there were press reports and there were notices from chairman camp and myself dating back to 2011. and you are saying he was not informed of this? >> let's divide this into a couple of pieces here. there was the processing of the cases. we were aware there were issues in the processing of the cases. we were not aware of the lists. i asked in late march, after the hearing, for us to go in and take a look. i thought there were problems and they came back with both pieces. there were problems with the cases and the listings. >> were given a briefing on the improper selection based on political belief and everything was, i think, may 3rd, 2012. is that correct? so i we characterize your question. >> i was informed of what we had been informed of to date. tigda was in there and there was a use of the list. us,list seems obnoxious to as it does to you, and we are going to take action. that was in may. >> you say it was not targeting, but was only one side of the political spectrum singled o

he can't dump it off on some rogue employees in cincinnati. it went all the way to the top. >> there were problems at the bottom. at the intermediary level and problems at the top. what disappoints me, greta, and you may remember this, we had an active program in 2004 and 2006 that i launched to look at churches and charities accused of politicking in terms of the '04 and '06 election cycle. c about 3s this revolved around mostly. can't help a candidate or oppose a candidate. we set up a unit within tege the governmental tax exempt group. it was out of dallas. it wasn't at the front end of the process where the people are doing the front work in cincinnati looking at the applications if you will. we did it and did it quickly and right before the election the naacp launched a broad site saying that we were trying to quash the black vote. i called up the same russell george and said russell, take a look at this. i think we done it correctly. nobody will believe, though, that we did. he did an audit on this, the same thing he did on the recent pr

serÁ por un grupo de individuos en cincinnati y no demuestra una cosa mÁs grande. >>> lo que me pareceue se habÍa generado adentro del servicio y la administraciÓn nos diga que no sabÍa, no tiene sentÓ id sentido. >> ahora su organizaciÓn tambiÉn sufriÓ percances cuando se comunicado con servicio de rentas internas. >> cuando solicitamos para la extensiÓn para pagar impuestos porque somos una organizaciÓn sinfÍnes de lucro. >>> sÍ, se tardÓ mÁs de un aÑo tuvimos que intervenir con abogados. >>> normalmente daniel, perdona, normalmente tarda de 2-4 meses? >>> es lo normal. se tardÓ un aÑo y formularios y trataron de trabar el proceso dleliberad deliberadamente. ahora no estoy diciendo que nos tomaron a nosotros. >> ahora que piensa usted entonces que se debe de hacer y no es posible piensa usted que en efecto grupos dentro del servicio de rentas internas sÍ acci acciÓn twarn de esa forma. sin que lo supiera la casa blanca. >>> es especie de corrupciÓn, debemos de rechazar el pueblo americano el uso de un elemento del estado para tratar de tapar las voces de opciosiciÓn o que estÉ actuan

>> for the most part, they are located in cincinnati. about 140 folks do this work in cincinnati. a handful of people around the country report in to cincinnati as well. >> in 2011, the report finds as the director of exempt organizations, e.o. on this chart, and i'm afraidi it's not on the screen yet. ms. lerner's position, became aware of the inappropriate criteria, and she ordered it changed. and it was changed in 2011 to not refer by name to tea party or patriot. mr. george, that correct? >> that is correct, sir. >> mr. miller, as then deputy, were you aware of the problem with the criteria in june and july of 2011? >> i was not, sir. >> in january 2012, the criteria were changed again to, and i quote, organizations involved in limiting or expanding government, educating on the constitution and bill of rights, and social, economic reform movement. the report indicates this change was made again in the cincinnati determinations office without executive approval. mr. george, is that correct? >> that is correct, sir. >> it was changed without executive approval? >> that is our un

>> well, we know for sure that it had to have gone up the chain within the cincinnati office, but there are also reports, you know, individual reports, that some of this was getting bounced back to washington, you know, for a secondary review. >> kim, what about the white house response to this? their basic point is, look, we didn't want to interfere with an investigation so we took complete hand's off, nobody told the president, the president didn't need to know. does that pass the credibility test? >> no. you know, this week was all about the white house's shifting story. who knew what and when. but increasingly, the press and congress is starting to say, what really matters is not what you knew over the last two months, it's what you knew and what you didn't do over the past two years. and the reality is you've got a president and a campaign team that themselves back in 2008 were often as a campaign, were targeting conservatives. the idea that there was just no knowledge or understanding about what could be happening in the irs, given all of these reports that were bubbling up and th

there was a news report reporting an anonymous cincinnati i was employed. you been taking a lot of grief here, and accordingly, this quote was attributed to this anonymous i was employed. well, we've got all the buzz with us and we knew it was wrong, we knew there would be hell to pay. we also knew that when it hits the fan, nobody at the top will take the blame, it will come right down the slide right through us. i wouldn't leak like that somewhere, lowest letter, the lady who doesn't do math but can -- said are holding who is now going to be working with the affordable health care act office, and that's my next question if we go to another row, is how on earth we do that to a 15,000 new employees trying to administer the affordable health care act with a lot of specific questions. let's move up to joseph grant who's the deputy tax commission. when th i going to hear from hi. he retired. mr. miller, you have apologized and then you are living. mr. shulman, you are six months out, so can't remember. mr. wilkins, the chief counsel of the irs is not your budd

they have newspapers and tv's in cincinnati too. and the requests coming from congress, from democrats, the whole suggestion that these 501 c groups were these new nefarious groups that really need additional oversight because they were overturning the entire system of electoral politics, that message, no question got through to the irs employees. whether or not they were acting of their own creative impulses or not. >> what about the argument, collin, that these -- you hear this from some of the liberals and defenders of the irs, that these groups deserve this kind of scrutiny because some of them were claiming to be social welfare groups and they were really engaging in partisan activity. so they needed this kind of scrutiny. >> oh, guess what? this was all part of the attack that came in the aftermath of citizens united, the supreme court came out and said, hey, you know what? people have more free speech than they thought they did. democrats were upset about this. nancy pelosi was very clear over the past week saying hey, citize

employees in cincinnati have been disciplined by the agency. we don't know what form that discipline took. a lot of republicans and some democrats today called for more employees to be punished, and possibly prosecuted. attorney general eric holder said i.r.s. specialists may have violated a variety of laws when they singled out conservative groups for special scrutiny, starting in 2010. >> the provisions that you have noted are ones that we are looking at, civil rights provisions, i.r.s. provisions, provisionally the hatch act. >> the hatch act prohibits federal employees from engaging in certain partisan activities. lying to congress is also a criminal offense. at least three top i.r.s. officials were asked repeatedly about reports that tea party groups were being targeted and they either denied it or dodged the questions. >> we've seen nothing but evasion in their testimony. >> reporter: republican charles boustany of louisiana sent three letters to the i.r.s. after he got complaints from conservative groups. but it took a six-month investig

the guys in the cincinnati field office were i think were politicly profiling. they were acting out of political malice. they were having a flood of applications and finding problems with the applications and they are painting with a broad brush stroke. some of the groups complained to members of congress who sent letters to the irs. the irs didn't fess up but did appoint an ig. now we have it up publicly and there will be remedies to this. we don't see real cover up. we don't see any evidence of outside political interference in this. as far as scandals go this is kind of self-contained and seems to be in the process of being fixed pretty quickly. >> we talk about being self contained. we see miller expressing an apology. we have lois lerner being the director of the irs tax exempt division issuing an apology while she was appearing before that crowd. we have yet to get a conversation as to whether or not she will appear. when we look at what happened in cincinnati how this bubbled up, is the big distinction of whether this targeting being such a term that the

which oversees the cincinnati unit which processed these applications. share the chairman's serious questions about why mr. schulman and miss lerner failed to inform congress about these problems. between, ladies and gentlemen, we are talking about truth and trust. to me this is one of their most significant failures. and i do not bleach their answers to date have been -- i do not believe their answers to date have been sufficient. truth and trust. i want to make a request of the chairman. now that the president has designated danny workel as the new head of the irs i think the committee should hear about his steps he intend to take to restore the public trust in the irs. as i said repeatedly. to do our jobs on this committee we must focus on oversight and reform. and reform. holding a hearing with him will allow us to do both. finally i would like to say a brief word about miss lerner. her attorney has written to the committee to inform us that she intend to invoke her fifth amendment right against self-incrimination. of course, i'm disappointed we'll n

it's not a couple people in cincinnati.t's a whole network of people, essentially trying to take the conservative groups, whether they are tea party or not, defund them and take them out of the 2012 election? that's the way i read this. >> well, and we need to know more. we need to know what the objective was here. what in the world the rationale was. we have constitutional protections against targeting individuals with the tax code or tax action. i just think this is an enormously serious matter. i'm confident that congress will go about its inquiry in a very serious way. but the public has a right to know and we need to hold those accountable for this targeting at that time irs strictly to the rule of law. >> with the oversight committees, do you think they're going to need a special council? someone who is completely independent of the obama administration? >> i don't know the answer to that. but i do think that the seriousness of this matter as it bears upon the privacy rights of individuals, the first amendment rights

. >> right, the people of ohio must be delighted to know that cincinnati is some political back water all of a sudden. by the way, this is a situation where they had specifically centralized all of the looking at tax exempt groups into cincinnati. oh, guess what we weren't paying any attention over there. that whole line is absurd, quite aside from whatever coordination there was as this information was run up to the chain to washington. >> paul: we also know there were letters sent from democrats in capitol hill including max balk us, chuck schumer a very powerful democrat essentially challenging the irs to go after these tax exempt groups. there a sense, while we don't know to what extent the irs, at least we don't know how they were responding to those requests. the it could have been a motive for the irs? >> for sure. no question about it. guess what, they have newspapers and tvs in cincinnati and the request coming from coming, the suggestion that these groups were dark money groups that really needed additional oversight because they were overturning the entire system of elector

. >> what goes on to cincinnati that they fell they had target the tea party? >> these are the questions that demand answers. that headed these agencies, they are a presidential appointee. eric holder is a very personal friend of the president. the irs commissioner, who was asked from the george bush administration was kept there by president obama. the question becomes, who knew anything about this? was attached over lunch -- it where was cincinnati it at a time when the tea party was ascended, a thorn in the administration's side. hey, let's get even with them. >> we are in the lender -- wonderland of the 501 c. why not just bag it? the rules are confusing. that is the defense of the bureaucrat. this is not unusual in government where they intentionally leave it for the bureaucrats to inter read. -- interpret it. the idea of obama was ordering this is far-fetched. we do not know yet but i am going to be shocked. >> i am not saying obama is, i am not suggesting it. where did the guys in cincinnati sitting around lunch decide, is it a hotbed of left- wing activ

we need to focus the investigation on cincinnati and go from the ground up. senator back us has done a good job and senator hatchet. we must get to the bottom of it. it's shaking the confidence of the american people in the internal revenue service, which is the wrong thing to have happen. >> a lot of senators said to him, you just sat on that guilty knowledge. that's a lie by omission. apparently he thought that he was well aware of it long before a few weeks ago. >> i think he was right. >> do you think the white house had any information on this before mid-april? >> i don't know. but i trusted mr. pfeiffer on the tv shows on sunday morning that he was incensed. he thought we ought to get to the bottom of it. the white house needs to let us get to the bottom of it. this is important for our country and the american people. quite frankly, important for the white house. >> it's odd what mr. pfeiffer said. what he said is that he didn't have much information yet you had jay carney saying on monday that as of the middle of april, the white house counsel and sen

both located in cincinnati, ohio. and the next level you have a director of rules and agreement and washington at the director of exempt organizations in washington. the next level the acting comigger in the government entity and you get to the deputy commissioner. mr. miller, you began in 2009; is that correct? that was while, mr. schulman, you were commissioner of the irs; is that correct? >> yes. >> then you turned to -- i turn to page 7 of the report, by the way, page 6 the irs policy statement talks about promoting public confidence which is obviously part of what the crux of the problem is here. i'm looking at page 7 of the record, -- report, and i note for the record, it's in the first full paragraph maybe the second sentence, quote, the determinations unit developed and implemented inappropriate criteria in part due to insufficient oversight provided by management. that's a management failure it's clear as can be. it says that the -- in that same paragraph, inappropriate criteria remained in place for more tha

so would you have been in cincinnati? >> no. >> you were never in cincinnati? >> no. >> so it is some outpost? >> i.r.s. is a nationwide organization. >> i understand that. if you believe it is uncomfortable sitting over there you waut to be a private individual when the i.r.s. is asking you questions. my question more specifically, how did cincinnati get to where they are? how did they develop that strategyry? how do they target your folks? just a couple of rookies show up, didn't know what they were doing? >> i would point to the repower on what happened. >> i understand that. these are low level people that pushed the wrong button. now, when cincinnati can't figure out, who do they confer with? back here to d.c.? >> there's two -- >> yes or no, does it come back to d.c.? >> yeah. >> ok, so d.c. and cincinnati should be pretty well connected so this does not come as a great shock to anybody. it establishes what the american people fear. i have a grandson who is afraid to get oust bed at night because he thinks someone is going to grab him and that is what ame

>> for the most part they are located in cincinnati. there's about 140 folks who do this sort of work in cincinnati. there are a handful of people around the country that report into cincinnati as well. >> in 2011, the report finds that the drug of exempt organizations, yo on the sir, and i'm afraid it's not on the screen yet, this is ms. learners decision, became aware of the inappropriate criteria. she ordered the criteria change and it was changed in 2011 to no longer referred by name tea party or patriot. mr. george, is that correct? >> that is correct, sir. >> mr. miller, as then deputy were you aware of the problem with the criteria in june and july of 2011? >> i was not, sir. spent back in january 2012, the criteria was changed again to come adecco, organizations involved in limiting expanding government, educating on the constitution and the bill of rights, and social economic reform movement. the ig's report indicates that this change was again made into cincinnati determination's office without executive approval. mr. george,

so would you have been in cincinnati? >> no. >> you were never in cincinnati? >> no.innati some outpost? >> so, obviously the irs is a nationwide organization. >> i know i understand that i understand that. >> and i want to tell you, listen, belief me, if you think it's uncomfortable sitting over there. you ought to be a private individual when the irs is across from you questioning. it's uncomfortable for everybody. my question more particularly how does cincinnati get to where they are? how do they develop that strategy and how do they know to go after these certain groups? how do they target those folks? that just couple rookies just showed up didn't really know what they were doing? >> so, again i would point to the tig nor report on what happened. >> i understand that i am hearing -- these are low level people that pushed the wrong button. now, when cincinnati can't figure out, who do they confer with? who is their counsel when they are looking at these entities? back here to d.c.? >> there is two possibilities. >> yes or no does it come back to d.c.? >> yeah. >>