Category: Internal Revenue Service

Do you remember Joe Biden’s promises on the IRS and taxes?

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Promise #1 broken: people making less than $400K would not see a tax increase

IRS has been targeting the middle class for audits after the $80 billion cash infusion

Reason outlines how Biden’s IRS has targeted the middle class taxpayer to bring in money for a regime with a spending problem.

Liar, liar: Back in August 2022, when some of us were fresh-faced and naive, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) assured us that their $80 billion infusion of cash (over the course of a decade, so they could hire some 87,000 new workers, including but not limited to men with guns) would actually be a means of targeting millionaire and billionaire scofflaws, not ordinary middle-class earners.

At the time, I voiced skepticism: Correspondence audits and other audits on low- and middle-income earners are simply the easiest to conduct. The IRS has historically spent an awful lot of time targeting these groups, not monied tax dodgers who can hire teams of accountants, so why would this time be different?

Vindicated: “The Internal Revenue Service got an audit of its own in time for Tax Day, and two irregularities jump out,” reports The Wall Street Journal, having labored through the latest Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) reports. “President Biden’s plan to hire a new army of tax collectors is falling flat, and the agents already at work are targeting the middle class.”

“As of last summer, 63% of new audits targeted taxpayers with income of less than $200,000,” reports the Journal. “Only a small overall share reached the very highest earners, while 80% of audits covered filers earning less than $1 million.”

Compare these real-world outcomes with the assurances of the IRS, given less than two years ago.

Empty assurances: “These resources are absolutely not about increasing audit scrutiny on small businesses or middle-income Americans. As we’ve been planning, our investment of these enforcement resources is designed around the Department of the Treasury’s directive that audit rates will not rise relative to recent years for households making under $400,000,” wrote IRS commissioner Charles Rettig in an August 2022 letter to concerned senators.

Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen was a bit sassier. “Contrary to the misinformation from opponents of this legislation, small business or households earning $400,000 per year or less will not see an increase in the chances that they are audited,” she wrote in a letter to Rettig.

It’s almost like they didn’t tell us the truth the first time around. But that’s not even the most embarrassing thing in the report: The IRS had set a goal of hiring 3,700 new agents in the first year of boosted funding. Instead, in the first six months, they’d hired 34.

(Read more at Reason)

Just by introducing the tax of inflation, Joe broke that promise.

In addition to his introducing the tax of inflation by distributing more money in the COVID relief (his cover for shutting us down in response to the Chinese-created COVID crisis that really only targeted a small portion of our population), Joe overblew his jump into a green state through anti-oil and anti-car executive orders. Thence, with these and a myriad of other bad decisions, he developed an exacerbated spending problem (not a income problem, as he maintains).

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Promise #2 broken: that Joe would “make the rich pay their fair share”

Sixty-three percent of new audits last year were aimed at middle-class filers

The Wall Street Journal laid out in great detail how the overwhelming majority of Joe Biden’s IRS audits have gone after middle class taxpayers.

The Internal Revenue Service got an audit of its own in time for Tax Day, and two irregularities jump out. President Biden’s plan to hire a new army of tax collectors is falling flat, and the agents already at work are targeting the middle class.

Those are two findings of the IRS’s watchdog, the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (Tigta). The report examines IRS progress on mandates from the Biden Administration backed by tens of billions in new funding. The first supposed goal was to audit more ultrawealthy and fewer middle-class filers, but it’s not going so well.

By last December the IRS decided that it wouldn’t begin tracking its progress until later this year. That’s because the agency has been slow to shift its focus to high-income taxpayers, who make up a small share of total filings. Its April 2023 strategic plan pledged that future audits would disproportionately target individuals making at least $400,000, but “did not include specifics on how the IRS was going to ensure it met this commitment,” says Tigta.

The most recent data suggests the IRS is still focused on the middle class. As of last summer, 63% of new audits targeted taxpayers with income of less than $200,000. Only a small overall share reached the very highest earners, while 80% of audits covered filers earning less than $1 million. Don’t forget to save those charitable-giving receipts.

(Read more at the Wall Street Journal)

Joe’s IRS went to the middle class for the same reason that Dillinger robbed banks

“That’s where the money is.”

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Promise #3 broken: that the greater funds to the IRS would build up the service to the people

Houston taxpayers in need of last-minute assistance turned away by IRS office as office closes for the day

Houston CBS affiliate KHOU tells us how the office on South Gessner Drive was overwhelmed with people seeking tax help, the IRS office was shut down, police were called for crowd control, and the people were told to go home without receiving their desired help.

Houston taxpayers looking to take advantage of free IRS help were turned away from a southwest Houston office Saturday.

The sudden closure of the IRS office on South Gessner Drive near the Southwest Freeway left many residents frustrated.

This office, along with 70 taxpayer assistance centers across the US, were offering special Saturday hours to help last-minute filers.

Although the office was supposed to close at 4 p.m., people waiting for assistance were told just before 11 a.m. the office would be closed.

“The doors were supposed to open at nine and they came out and they said we’re not serving nobody today. I been out here with my elderly mom since 6:30 this morning, people literally were here at 12 o’clock last night,” said resident Calvetta Brandyberg.

When KHOU 11 News reached out to the IRS, they sent a statement acknowledging the delays and said in part they occurred “due to overwhelming taxpayer demand for assistance.”

(Read more at KHOU)

Let’s just take the last word out of the of the “Internal Revenue Service”

There is no more service there.

On a drive-time radio show, an interview of Adam Andrzejewski of Open the Books claimed that people have turned to calling members of Congress because the IRS has become so unresponsive.

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All sorts of things seem to be whirling around Hunter Biden, but he is not the real center of activity


First, the stories that whiff around the real topic

Attorney General Merrick Garland is the “senior” Biden official in Hunter Biden IRS whistleblower claim

The New York Post looks into the claim that Merrick Garland shielded Hunter Biden (as proposed in a letter from an IRS whistleblower’s attorney).

Attorney General Merrick Garland is the unnamed official whose sworn testimony to Congress is being challenged in a bombshell letter from an IRS whistleblower’s attorney alleging a cover-up in the Hunter Biden criminal investigation, The Post has learned.

Attorney Mark Lytle wrote Wednesday that the longtime IRS employee wants to provide information to congressional leaders to “contradict sworn testimony to Congress by a senior political appointee” — Garland — and also to detail “preferential treatment” in the criminal probe of the first son.

The whistleblower already made disclosures to the inspectors general of the Treasury and Justice departments.

However, due to a quirk of federal law, he needs congressional approval to more fully describe his allegations to his own lawyers, which he wants to do before testifying to lawmakers.

Garland has repeatedly claimed under oath that Delaware US Attorney David Weiss, a Trump administration holdover recommended in 2017 by the state’s Democratic senators, is able to criminally charge Hunter Biden without the permission of other Justice Department leaders, despite Republicans challenging the factual accuracy of that claim.

Garland in April 2022 told Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-Tenn.) that “there will not be interference of any political or improper kind” in the investigation of Hunter Biden led by Weiss.

“He is the supervisor of this investigation,” Garland said of Weiss, adding that “we put the investigation in the hands of a Trump appointee from the previous administration, who is the US attorney for the district of Delaware, and … you have me as the attorney general, who is committed to the independence of the Justice Department from any influence from the White House in criminal matters.”

In March, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) pressed Garland on whether Weiss was truly able to bring charges without the approval of other Justice Department officials, specifically if the alleged crime occurred outside Delaware.

“In April 2022, you testified to Sen. Hagerty that the Hunter Biden investigation was insulated from political interference because it was assigned, as you just now told me, to the Delaware US Attorney’s Office,” Grassley said at the time.

“However, that could be misleading.

“Without special counsel authority, he could need permission of another US attorney in certain circumstances to bring charges outside the district of Delaware.

(Read the words between Grassley and Garland that may constitute perjury at the New York Post)

Hunter Biden, the crack-crazed nere-do-well, is not the kingpin nor who we should focus upon

We cannot let this become about Hunter Biden’s misactions. Likewise, (even though it is tempting to think about how Garlnd may have perjured himself before Congress) we cannot get our eyes off of the real prize.

We cannot let this be about anything but the Biden crime organization and the “Big Guy” at the top.

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IRS whistleblower has told Congress that Hunter Biden probe is being mishandled

ABC News reports in the most obscure means possible on the malfeasance of the Biden regime (or possibly the “Biden syndicate”).

A supervisor at the IRS has told lawmakers that he has information that suggests the Biden administration could be mishandling the investigation into President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, sources familiar with the matter told ABC News.

In a letter to lawmakers obtained by ABC News, the lawyer for the IRS whistleblower says his client is an IRS criminal supervisory special agent “who has been overseeing the ongoing and sensitive investigation of a high-profile, controversial subject since early 2020 and would like to make protected whistleblower disclosures to Congress.”

The letter does not name Hunter Biden specifically, but lawmakers have been made aware he is the “high profile, controversial” subject that the lawyer is referring to. In addition, while the letter refers to preferential treatment that Hunter Biden has allegedly received, there are no specific examples provided to support the accusations.

The letter says that “The protected disclosures: (1) contradict sworn testimony to Congress by a senior political appointee, (2) involve failure to mitigate clear conflicts of interest in the ultimate disposition of the case, and (3) detail examples of preferential treatment and politics improperly infecting decisions and protocols that would normally be followed by career law enforcement professionals in similar circumstances if the subject were not politically connected.”

The lawyer for the whistleblower didn’t immediately respond to ABC’s request for comment. A spokesperson for DOJ declined to comment.

The Wall Street Journal first reported news of the letter.

“It’s deeply concerning that the Biden Administration may be obstructing justice by blocking efforts to charge Hunter Biden for tax violations,” House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.), said in a statement.

(Read a spoon or more of pabulum at ABC News)

If this investigation does not look into the impropriety of the Biden family, it misses the mark

The primary focus of this investigation cannot be Hunter. It cannot be the other eleven family members identified by Representative Comer as having received foreign monies. The focus must be on Joe and the entire organization.

Still, one has to wonder whether the Wall Street Journal‘s breaking of this letter was the only reason that ABC News got off of dead center to investigate Hunter.

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Ex-top spy admits Hunter Biden laptop letter designed to influence 2020 election, Blinken involved

Just The News explores the admissions of career intelligence officer Michael J. Morell as he admits Anthony Blinken directed the creation of the letter that mislead a national election.

A former acting CIA director has admitted to Congress that he helped organize the letter that falsely portrayed Hunter Biden’s laptop as Russian disinformation in an effort to influence the 2020 election in favor of Joe Biden and that his role was “triggered” by a call from current Secretary of State Antony Blinken, according to a letter released Thursday by House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan.

The extraordinary admission by career intelligence officer Michael J. Morell provides stunning evidence that the now-infamous letter from 51 security officials in October 2020 was not an organic intelligence community initiative but rather a political dirty trick originating with Blinken and the Biden campaign.

Jordan sent a letter demanding Blinken answer a series of questions about Morell’s stunning testimony, as lawmakers weighed the enormity of America’s top diplomat being willing to accuse a nuclear-armed superpower of interfering in the 2020 election without evidence. That letter included major snippets of Morell’s testimony.

Morell, who retired as deputy CIA director after a long and storied career and served as its acting chief, was on the short list in fall 2020 to be Biden’s CIA director when he became involved in the letter. He ultimately did not receive the job.

In a transcribed interview with the House Judiciary government weaponization subcommittee, Morell admitted he got involved with the letter after a conversation with Blinken and later received a call from the Biden campaign thanking him when Joe Biden used the letter and its false implication to blunt criticism of Hunter Biden’s foreign business dealings

The transcript of Morell’s interview showed he had no intent to write the statement and that Blinken’s “call triggered” his actions.

The same day Blinken reached out to Morell, an article was published in USA Today alleging that the FBI was looking into the laptop as part of a “disinformation campaign.”

“Morell testified that his communication with you was one of a few communications he had with the Biden campaign, explaining that he also received a call from Steve Ricchetti, Chairman of the Biden campaign, following the October 22 debate to thank him for writing the letter,” Jordan wrote Blinken.

(Go to Just The News for a link to the letter and more details)

There is a reason that Blinken directed attention away from the laptop. It had nothing to do with Hunter.

Of course, everyone with  a brain knows that the only reason Blinken had the letter generated was to win Biden the Oval Office. Likewise, the only reason Blinken is Secretary of State is that he had the letter created.

With that loop closed, we also know that only the brain dead will be voting for Joe. Therefore, I guess Joe can count on swampy Republican votes and Democrats.

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Hunter Biden may be living at the White House to evade legal papers from his baby mama

The New York Post slides into the muck of this unseemly story where we might think the “Big Guy” might be hiding little Hunter from having to pay child support. That stands as the least of Joe Biden’s worries here.

Hunter Biden is believed to be hiding out at the White House while his baby mama goes on the warpath.

Lawyers for former stripper Lunden Roberts asked an Arkansas court Friday to jail the first son for failing to fork over his financial records as required in her lawsuit over support payments for their 4-year-old unacknowledged daughter, Navy.

Roberts claims Hunter, 53, is “flaunting the dignity and authority of the court” by failing to provide “one single item or word [of] discovery” and says, “This court should incarcerate the defendant in the Cleburne County Detention Center until he complies with this court’s orders.”

Roberts, 32, had to get a court-ordered paternity test to prove Navy was Hunter’s, and last year Hunter applied to have his monthly support payments reduced. 

She also has enlisted Biden nemesis Garrett Ziegler as an expert witness for the trial expected in July.

The 27-year-old former Trump adviser is founder of the nonprofit Marco Polo, which published a 644-page analysis of Hunter’s infamous laptop last year, identifying hundreds of alleged crimes.

Tracking the first son

Ziegler is being sued by Hunter’s “sugar brother,” wealthy Hollywood lawyer Kevin Morris, for alleged harassment and invasion of privacy.

Morris generously paid off Hunter’s $2.8 million IRS bill, which is part of a federal criminal investigation by the US attorney in Delaware, David Weiss, into the first son’s overseas business dealings.

Things were brought to a head last week when a career IRS criminal supervisory special agent who has been investigating Hunter for three years came forward with claims that federal prosecutors are preventing tax charges from being brought against the president’s son.

“Preferential treatment and politics [are] improperly infecting decisions” in the case, the whistleblower’s attorney, Mark Lytle, alleged in a letter to Democrats and Republicans leading various congressional committees.

(Read more on legal maneuvers and the Secret Service at the New York Post)

One thing Joe really doesn’t want exposed is the money that flows through Hunter and from whom that money flows

Having those money transfers and checks exposed might be impeachment material. However, since the Chinese bank has already provided enough for that, maybe this would be worrying over nothing.

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Now for the story that comes closer to the real topic

Closer to the mark: ex-Obama staffer blows whistle on Biden “kickback scheme” after Hunter joined Burisma – “Malfeasance in office”

Fox News explores the report from the former Obama stenographer who witnessed the Biden kickback scheme in action.

A former Obama administration staffer is blowing the whistle on the Biden family’s business dealings, accusing President Biden of being involved in a “kickback scheme” in connection with his son Hunter’s overseas business dealings while he was vice president.

Mike McCormick, a stenographer for the White House for 15 years, told “Fox & Friends First” the FBI has been ignoring his alarms on the matter despite his willingness to testify under oath before the federal grand jury investigating Hunter.

“In February, I went to the FBI and filed one of their tips on their website. If you do that, and you’re lying to them, you go to jail. I’m not lying. I’m telling the truth, and I’m not going to jail,” McCormick said Thursday. “Joe Biden is a criminal. He was conducting malfeasance in office to enrich his family. Jake Sullivan is a conspirator in that, and there’s more… Obama officials involved in it, I believe.”

McCormick, who worked with Biden from 2011 to 2017, detailed a key dialogue involving the vice president, aide Jake Sullivan and the press on Air Force Two before a trip to Kyiv, Ukraine, on April 21, 2014.

Sullivan, who is the current national security adviser, outlined in a White House transcript Biden’s priorities for his trip to the country, which included U.S. investment in the Ukrainian energy sector days after Hunter joined the board of Burisma, according to the New York Post.

Months later, and well after the trip, Congress allocated $50 million to Ukraine’s energy market.

“I’m sitting back there with a tape recorder. Jake Sullivan comes back and somebody asks about fracking. His answer is, well, we’re bringing a lot of American assistance over for fracking. Burisma was the direct beneficiary of that fracking, and that’s what I recorded, and that’s in a White House transcript,” McCormick said.

“In the transcript, you don’t know who Jake Sullivan is. It’s a senior administration official. I’m the witness that says Jake Sullivan is the guy who said it and he should be investigated because at the time Hunter Biden was on the board of Burisma and Joe Biden is bringing American taxpayer money to enrich that company and himself and his family,” he continued.

Hunter joined the board of the Ukrainian natural gas firm on April 18, just three days before Biden and his team traveled to Kyiv. But that critical piece of the puzzle was not made public until May 12.

McCormick argued the timeline of the events suggests that Biden funneled American money overseas to “enrich” himself and his family, and used his own influence to aid his son’s rookie energy career.

The former stenographer made it clear he wants to present the information under oath before the grand jury in Delaware probing Hunter’s business dealings, which is led by U.S. Attorney David Weiss.

(Read of additional federal investigations into Hunter at Fox News)

Here is the point where we learn two things

At this point, we learn:

  • Whether or not Republicans of any stripe have gonads and
  • Whether or not any Democrats have morals remaining in their otherwise mush-filled skulls.

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Biden continues to make himself an international spectacle


Biden’s Democrat machine weaponizes the judicial system

In a movement that did not exist before, Biden has enabled “America last” as an international movement

The Wall Street Journal reports on the banana republic judicial system created by Joe Biden’s Democrat party. You know, the same one that delivered 4 a.m. surges of ballots across multiple states.

Exact charges against former president aren’t known; case centers on hush-money payments to porn star

Donald Trump was indicted for his role in paying hush-money to a porn star on the eve of the 2016 election, marking the first time in American history that a former president has faced criminal charges.

The grand jury returned the indictment of Mr. Trump after a vote on Thursday, kicking off a process in which the former president is expected to come to New York to face the charges. The indictment, sought by the office of Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, isn’t public.

(Read as much as you can afford at the Wall Street Journal)

Thanks to Matt Taibbi, we know Biden has used the FBI to rig the “instant press” (Twitter and other social media). We know the main stream media ignores big stories for Biden

We know the judicial system now is under Democrat control. Thugs get out by bending a knee to BLM, Antifa, or just the judge. However, Biden started his political prisoner system with the 6 January 2021 persecution and now has his prize.

Considering that Biden already crippled the social media (which should be considered an “instant press”) by using his FBI to push them into their already liberal tendencies, this is sad.

Knowing that Biden has killed two banks by allowing a “woke” group to go more-or-less unregulated, maybe we should expect Democrat mindlessness. Knowing that Biden then dumps the bailout of the billionaire Chinese and billionaire American investors on common American bank account holders, we know to expect Democrat selectiveness. Equity? That’s just a Democrat catch phrase for the weak-minded.

And seeing that Biden has sent his IRS to intimidate journalists like Taibbi, we know we have re-entered a banana republic. Hopefully, Dementia Joe hasn’t learned too much from the oppressive ways of Obama and Lois Lerner.

One thing that I wonder: are the Democrats setting us (or the more easily angered among us) up for another 6 January riot?

Biden and Harris funded the bails of Antifa and Black Lives Matter thugs who burned blocks of businesses during 2020. But who cares for capitalists among the Democrats? That wsa only the life savings of those capitalists.

But when 6 January came and a few people broke windows and a greater number of people walked between the ropes set up in the Capitol — that was a “real” insurrection.

What has me wondering is this: since the Democrats would rather investigate common people who did not burn down cities, are they going to do more of the same with this trial of President Trump?

Does anyone care to retweet this?

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Due to Biden’s weakness, Russia has built a large and growing following

In a movement that did not exist before, Biden has enabled “America last” as an international movement

The Wall Street Journal exposes Biden’s method of restricting money to banks dealing in a perfectly legal (but currently uncontrolled by government) market: cryptocurrency.

Some financial regulators appear to have seized on a series of high-profile meltdowns to go around Congress and try to freeze an entire industry out of banking services.

I spent more than a decade as a federal prosecutor on some of the worst threats our country faces—organized crime, the opioid epidemic, political corruption and terrorism. In my final years at the Justice Department, I shifted to cases involving emerging technology, including the then-nascent crypto category, from the Mt. Gox hack to the corrupt Silk Road agents. Years later, the space continues to attract crime and fraud, but it has also drawn some of the brightest engineering talent in the world. Public blockchains, the foundational technology of the ecosystem, are an important set of tools that reflect breakthroughs in cryptography and distributed computing. In addition to early financial-use cases, this sector provides new ways to develop, monetize and govern all kinds of software.

(Read as much as you can afford at the Wall Street Journal)

If BRICS follows the way that Russia has planned, our dollar is sunk

All becuase of Democrat weakness, specifically Dementia Joe’s weakness, we might see the end of the petrodollar. That would mean the end of the dollar as the reserve currency for most of the world. That would mean much of the money being held across the world would be traded in for other currency. That would mean that our inflation woes have only begun.

Thanks, Joe. Thanks, Democrats that have us set for a multi-trillion dollar debt. Thanks, Democrats who prioritize the nebulous “climate change” agenda over jobs.

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After almost a decade of seeing Obama’s tricks and over two years of practicing tricks on oil and gas, Biden branches out

Biden threatens to withhold money from banks dealing in crypto just as Obama withheld finances from banks dealing with gun manufacturers

Bloomberg quotes Jim O’Neill as he urges the anti-American alliance BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) to expand and throw off American dominance (and Saudi Arabia, Iran, and numerous Middle Eastern countries have since joined).

Jim O’Neill, the former Goldman Sachs Group Inc. chief economist who coined the acronym BRIC, said the bloc of nations that later adopted the name should expand and work to counter the dollar’s dominance.

In a paper published in the Global Policy journal on March 26, O’Neill called on the group to apply strict criteria to ensure the addition of any new members to its ranks helps further its aims and urged it to focus on climate finance, improving healthcare and boosting trade.

(Read more at a cost if you pay up at Bloomberg)

Crypto does not interest me because it does not have anything to back its worth; however, it also does not fall under government control

Since there is a chance to park money into a venue that escapes the intrusive eye of the government, it seems to have the Biden regime riled up. It seems that Biden has embraced his inner dictator.

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Biden upgrades to gaffes after entertaining us with his up-the-stairs trips

Canadian lawmakers laugh after Biden accidentally applauds China: “You can tell what I’m thinking”

Fox News reports on Biden’s gaffe of applauding China in front of the Canadian Parliament and those politicians’ resulting laughter.

President Biden accidentally commended China instead of Canada while praising the nation’s stance on migration on Friday.

Biden made the gaffe during a speech at the Canadian Parliament in Ottawa while he was discussing U.S. immigration policies.

“In the United States, we’re expanding legal pathways for migration, to seek safety and humanitarian…humanitarian basis, while discouraging unlawful migration that feeds exploitation and human trafficking,” the president began.

“So today, I applaud China for stepping out…excuse me, I applaud Canada,” Biden stumbled while Canadian Members of Parliament laughed.

(Read more at Fox News)

Biden must have been thinking on to the next payment to the “Big Guy”

We now have the bank records in Congress for a few of the transactions. When will we start with impeachment?

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In a bizarre shell game of shuffling illegal aliens to a Red state that has bussed illegals out, Biden keeps up a petty show

Biden flies illegals caught at Canada border to Texas

VOA News touches on the issue of Biden flying illegal aliens (who have chosen to detour through Canada) into Texas. Although VOA News takes the stance that this act constitutes a deterrance to illegals, I think it to be a slap in the face of Texas (whose governor has been busing illegals to Blue States for years, now).

U.S. authorities have been flying migrants caught illegally crossing the U.S.-Canada border to Texas as part of a deterrence effort to tackle a rise in crossings, according to authorities, flight records and a Reuters witness.

U.S. Border Patrol has quietly transported about 100 migrants this month on two charter flights from Plattsburgh, New York, near the border with Canada, to the Texas cities of Harlingen and El Paso.

The southbound flights from the northern border are a break from past practice as the United States deals with a sharp rise in migrants crossing illegally from Canada, current and former officials told Reuters.

At the same time, asylum-seekers have been crossing from the United States into Canada in record numbers, straining resources. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has pledged to raise migration issues with U.S. President Joe Biden during meetings in Ottawa on Thursday and Friday.

U.S. Border Patrol apprehended nearly 2,900 people crossing illegally from Canada into the United States in the five months since October, more than all of fiscal year 2022. About half of those were Mexicans, who do not need a visa to travel to Canada.

Gil Kerlikowske, a former commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), Border Patrol’s parent agency, said he could not recall the agency using charter flights for migrants caught crossing from Canada.

“The whole northern border issue wasn’t nearly as much on the radar,” he said.

(Read the Biden line at VOA News)

Surely, part of this is a poke in the eye for Governor Abbott for having bussed illegals to points liberal

Certainly, part of Joe’s reasoning for sending illegals to Texas rests in payback. Otherwise, if he wanted to present a deterent to the illegals, he would drop them off in the downtown districts of Democrat hell-holes of crime like New York City (where 4-year-old girls are shot in Times Square) or Chicago (where we are up to 161 shot during the first three months of 2023).

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Biden’s is not the normal cross-border illegals

Biden has allowed in illegals from 147 nations between October 2022 and February 2023

Fox News informs us of the illegal aliens from 147 nations that entered America between October 2022 and February 2023.

Border Patrol Chief Raul Ortiz said this week that his agents have encountered hundreds of thousands of migrants from more than 140 countries — in the same week he told lawmakers that DHS does not have “operational control” of the southern border.

“So far, in FY23, U.S. Border Patrol apprehended 900,590 individuals from 147 countries,” Ortiz said. FY 2023 began in October.

The top five countries for apprehensions were Mexico, Cuba, Nicaragua, Colombia and Guatemala.

Ortiz’s announcement came as Customs and Border Protection (CBP) announced that there were 154,998 migrant encounters overall at the southern border in February, down from the 166,010 encountered in February 2022 and down slightly from the 156,770 encountered in January 2023. In February 2021, there were 101,099 encounters and 36,687 encounters in February 2020.

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Don’t forget the people and contraband we never saw

Thank Biden for all of the fentanyl and other contraband (drugs, human, terrorist, and other) that made it over the border and into your city.

…

 

The truth is that Biden’s IRS has and will target the poor


When House Republicans try to cut the number of IRS agents, Biden acts like the Republicans have attacked the poor

Politico explores the notion that Biden can just attack those who would question his shortcomings in top secret documents, border policy, supply chain, energy policy, inflation, attacking political opposition, and other issues.

TREND WATCH — Per FiveThirtyEight, President JOE BIDEN’s average approval rating is now 44.1%, the highest it’s been since October 2021.

IS BEST DEFENSE A GOOD OFFENSE? — January is a time of new beginnings in Washington. A new Congress. A new Republican-led House. A new speaker, KEVIN McCARTHY. New investigations into Biden by GOP-helmed committees.

And now, in light of all of the above, there’s a new effort from the White House to go on offense against Republicans like never before.

Like so many Washington trends these days, it started with a tweet.

“It’s a giant tax cut for rich tax cheats. Bill #1 from the new House GOP,” RON KLAIN, the very online White House chief of staff, wrote in a Monday afternoon tweet about an effort to roll back Biden’s IRS funding boost. Later that evening, VP KAMALA HARRISechoed the sentiment, accusing House Republicans of “rushing to … allow too many millionaires, billionaires and corporations to cheat the system.”

On its face, those messages can seem fairly run-of-the-mill. But a closer look reveals the change at hand — one informed by a few key calculations:

1. The era of big bipartisan successes on the Hill is likely over (for now).

In the run-up to the midterms, Biden and his allies consistently called out Republicans on a wide array of issues. But given a 50-50 Senate and the reality of needing some GOP support to advance a legislative agenda, there was reluctance to go all-out in framing Republicans as the enemy.

Those days are gone — though the White House promises Biden is ready to cut bipartisan deals with the GOP.

A Republican House is unlikely to advance any of Biden’s legislative priorities heading into a presidential election, and a Democratic Senate is equally unlikely to rubber-stamp any of McCarthy’s. The reality is that there are a small number of issues with room for bipartisan legislative success ahead of 2024; when it comes to going after Republicans, there’s not much benefit to keeping the powder dry.

2. Most legislative efforts will aim to frame the debate, not enact laws.

This is a reality that both Republicans and Democrats understand, given the split control of the Hill. To cite just one example, House Republicans know that the abortion-related bills they passed without any Democratic votes on Wednesday stand no shot of becoming law; it was a messaging exercise and an effort to show that they were living up to their campaign-season promises.

And as Republicans eagerly move to show they’re fighting Biden and advancing a conservative agenda, Biden and his team are eager to use those efforts to draw a contrast.

“[President Biden] believes that an important part of that process is being honest with his colleagues and the American people about disagreements, like his opposition to preventing wealthy tax cheats from foisting the tax burden onto middle-class families or subjecting our military to budget cuts,” White House deputy press secretary ANDREW BATES said in a statement when asked about the “tax cheat” messaging on display this week.

(Read the last point at Politico)

However, if you ignore the political debate and look at the facts, the Democrats have depleted more of what the poor rely on and audit more of the poor through the IRS

Obviously the lies of the Democrat press and the lies of Democrat politicians work for 44.1% of those polled by FiveThirtyEight.

It looks like some may not believe their lying eyes when Biden tells them prices are falling and Democrats are protecting their rights.

However, if you look at the next few articles, you will see that the progressives have depleted Social Security and Medicare. Additionally, you will find that the IRS focuses more of their efforts on middle class and poor Americans.

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Touching on a topic the Democrats have been gaslighting for years: the solvency of Social Security

Social Security and Medicare are approaching insolvency

The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget exposes a bit of Democrat gaslighting: Social Security and Medicare can no longer be piggy banks to progressive Democrats and Republicans.

The Social Security and Medicare Trustees released their annual reports on the state of the trust funds today. The Trustees find that Medicare’s Hospital Insurance trust fund will be insolvent by 2028, Social Security’s Old-Age and Survivors Insurance trust fund will run out of reserves by 2034, and the theoretically combined Social Security trust funds will be insolvent by 2035. Upon insolvency, Social Security benefits will be reduced across-the-board by 20 percent under current law while Medicare Hospital Insurance payments will be reduced by 10 percent.

The following is a statement from Maya MacGuineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget:

Social Security is only 13 years from insolvency and Medicare is only 6 years. Policymakers need to get their heads out of the sand and stop pretending these vital programs’ funding issues will fix themselves.

Today’s youngest retirees will be 68 years old when Medicare runs out of reserves and 75 years old when Social Security becomes insolvent. Workers under the age of 55 will retire into an insolvent system. At the time of Social Security insolvency, all beneficiaries will face a 20 percent cut in their benefits if we do nothing.

Social Security’s 3.4 percent of payroll shortfall is a slight improvement from last year but would still require the equivalent of a 20 percent benefit reduction or a 26 percent tax increase to close. If we wait until 2035, benefits would need to be cut by a quarter or taxes raised by a third, and we wouldn’t be able to give workers and retirees time to adjust to this new reality.

Combined with last week’s projections from CBO, we have a bleak fiscal future ahead of us. It doesn’t have to be this way – we can start enacting thoughtful reforms that increase revenue, reduce spending, lower health care costs, stamp out today’s rampant inflation, help grow the economy, and secure our trust funds. But first policymakers need to open their eyes to the challenges we face.

(continued)

Read our preliminary analysis here: Trustees: Social Security and Medicare Headed for Insolvency in 13 and 6 Years

(Read the whole letter from this government agency at the CRFB)

Truth of this matter is that, by shorting Social Security, progressives have abandoned the poor

By taking funds out of the Social Security net and using it for other progressive causes, both Republican and Democrat progressives have lead the poor out onto the branch of Social Security just as it gets sawed off or breaks of its own weight.

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You may remember a lie of Joe’s where he said that he wouldn’t raise taxes on the poor. Well, maybe that’s quibbling over the semantics between raising taxes and auditing

In 2022, the IRS went after the very poorest taxpayers

Reason exposes the fact that Joe’s IRS went heavily after poor and middle class citizens in 2022.

On Wednesday, Syracuse University’s Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC) released data provided to it by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) on audits performed by the agency in fiscal year 2022. Despite the infusion of new funding earmarked for the IRS via last year’s Inflation Reduction Act, the agency continued historic trends of hassling primarily low-income taxpayers, with relatively few millionaires and billionaires getting caught up in the audit sweep.

“The taxpayer class with unbelievably high audit rates—five and a half times virtually everyone else—were low-income wage-earners taking the earned income tax credit,” reported TRAC, noting that the poorest taxpayers are “easy marks in an era when IRS increasingly relies upon correspondence audits yet doesn’t have the resources to assist taxpayers or answer their questions.”

In fact, “if one ignores the fiction of auditing a millionaire through simply sending a letter through the mail, the odds that millionaires received a regular audit by a revenue agent (1.1%) was actually less than the audit rate of the targeted lowest income wage-earners whose audit rate was 1.27 percent!”

The Inflation Reduction Act, passed in August 2022, directed $80 billion worth of new funding over the next decade to the IRS so it could hire 87,000 new workers, purportedly to better target millionaire and billionaire scofflaws. The Biden administration and credulous journalists claimed that this would in no way increase audits for those making under $400,000 annually—suspect assurances not provided within the text of the actual bill. This increased capacity meant only those at the top would be targeted, supporters insisted. But this ignores how the IRS’s incentives work and how agency-wide reform might be too heavy of a lift.

Correspondence audits—which are conducted via mail, and are the type frequently used when interacting with the poorest of taxpayers—are much easier and cheaper to conduct than other types of audits. Plus, the earned income tax credit is easy to get wrong. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates that new hires with experience in the field will take almost three years of ramp-up time, with more junior new hires taking longer. The lag time between 2022’s infusion of funding, and legitimately increased capacity, will be enormous—if the agency can even snag the best in the industry when TurboTax and H&R Block will surely be swelling their own ranks. It makes sense that, given a dearth of experienced auditors not likely to be fixed soon, the agency would rely on the easiest and least time-consuming types of audits.

(Read five reasons Biden’s suggestion [that audits will fall on the rich] will not work at Reason)

Maybe we are quibbling semantics, but when the major target of audits is the poor, then saying you don’t raise their taxes doesn’t matter

Additionally, if you vote on social justice, how much justice is there in Biden’s promise to soak the rich, but his practice of auditing the poor?

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