Good news, the new head of the IRS might actually be doing something right. Three weeks ago we learned that despite being embroiled in scandal and under sequestration, IRS employees were going to received $70 million in bonuses, but it looks like acting IRS Commissioner Danny Werfel is trying to put the brakes on that cash flow.
The acting IRS chief told agency employees on Tuesday that bonuses for managers would be canceled this year, and that he was working to do the same for union staffers.
The acting IRS chief told agency employees on Tuesday that bonuses for managers would be canceled this year, and that he was working to do the same for union staffers.
Danny Werfel, who took over the reins at the IRS in May, told staffers across-the-board spending cuts had required bonuses be suspended elsewhere in the federal bureaucracy, and agency employees serving under union contracts shouldn’t be treated any differently. Werfel is seeking to stop bonuses for senior executives as well.
But of course, Werfel isn't willing to take full responsibility for IRS actions and won't admit bonuses are being scaled back due to inappropriate behavior by employees.
While the tax-collecting agency remains under fire for its targeting of conservative groups, Werfel did not mention the current controversy and said scrapping the bonuses was not a comment on the work staffers were doing.
“This is not a reflection of the quality or performance of the work done by you and your colleagues, but rather an unfortunate byproduct of the difficult budgetary situation we find ourselves in,” Werfel wrote in his message to employees.
As a reminder, not only did the IRS inappropriately target conservative groups, but they also spent millions of taxpayer dollars on lavish conferences.