Washington, D.C. February 5, 2013. In 2006, Congress created the IRS Whistleblower
Program, which has encouraged whistleblowers to expose vast amounts of
tax fraud, and has the potential to expose many billions more.
Despite the demonstrated success of the program, the IRS is now proposing proposed regulations that:
- Severely restrict the scope of the IRS Whistleblower Program by excluding large categories of tax-related violations
- Prohibit whistleblowers for collecting an award
on technical grounds even if the IRS would never have discovered the tax
fraud without the whistleblowers' information
- Severely limit the size of whistleblower awards
by setting the default award percentage to the smallest possible allowed
under law
- Fail to require the IRS to act on whistleblower
claims, allowing whistleblower claims to linger for years without
resolution or oversight
These types of roadblocks and disqualifications
have been discredited. With your help, for example, we successfully
fought the SEC's attempts at similar restrictions.
We need you to take swift action, and join us-and whistleblower advocates such as Senator Grassley-in commenting on the IRS's proposed regulations before they become final. The IRS must receive public comments by February 19, 2013.
Senator Grassley's letter to the IRS is available here.
Please pass this action alert along to friends and
whistleblower advocates. The IRS must be told in strong terms that they
cannot undermine the effectiveness of the IRS Whistleblower Program, a
critical tool in exposing tax fraud.
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