As Second IRS Official Pleads The Fifth, Congress Pushes For “Lerner Rule”.

Greg Roseman, a Deputy Director at the Internal Revenue Service, didn’t make any friends on the Hill last month when he refused to testify at a House Oversight Committee hearing. It was the second time in recent memory that an Internal Revenue Service employee had invoked a Fifth Amendment right not to testify.

Roseman follows hot on the heels of Lois Lerner’s invocation of the Fifth Amendment a month earlier in the wake of the IRS tax exempt scandal. Roseman, like Lerner, is still employed by the IRS. It’s important to note, however, that Roseman’s testimony was solicited as part of an ongoing investigation about his relationship with a contractor who won big dollar federal contracts. The testimony was not related to the tax exempt scandal – though the timing is close enough that it has cast a dark shadow over the already beleaguered agency.

Kelly Erb, as The Taxgirl, has published a blog speaking about the “Lerner Rule” which would handle federal employees testifying before a congressional hearing.The bill, H.R. 2458, has been referred to the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. The text of the bill is pretty short and to the point. It says: Read More