President Barack Obama said Monday that he first learned the IRS may have improperly targeted conservative political groups when the news broke late last week and vowed action if charges of "outrageous" political bias turn out to be true.
If Internal Revenue Service officials improperly examined the tax-exempt status of groups with conservative leanings, "then that?s outrageous, and there?s no place for it, and they have to be held fully accountable," Obama said during a joint question-and-answer session with British Prime Minister David Cameron in the East Room in the White House.
But Obama emphasized that an investigation was underway and that he did not want to rush to judgment.
"You don?t want the IRS ever being perceived to be biased and anything less than neutral in how they operate," the president said. The IRS must have "absolute integrity."
Obama's strong words followed an outcry from many Republicans over the IRS's apparent display of political bias. Maine Sen. Susan Collins, a GOP moderate, said Sunday that the IRS?s actions needed to be ?personally condemned? by the president, who must ?make crystal clear that this is totally unacceptable.?
Collins also called into question the IRS?s early claim that the improper behavior was the work of low-level employees.
"I just don't buy that this was a couple of rogue IRS employees," she said, underlining that "groups with 'progressive' in their names were not targeted similarly."
Obama also pushed back hard against Republican-driven charges that his administration tried to cover up the role terrorists played in the Sept. 11, 2012, attack in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi, which claimed the lives of four Americans, including Ambassador Chris Stevens.
"There's no there, there," he said.
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/obama-likely-face-first-media-irs-scandal-141910951.html
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