Update “Off Again” – Rep. Darrell Issa doesn’t know what he’s talking about, the attorney for former IRS official Lois Lerner said Sunday.
Issa, the California Republican who chairs the House Oversight and Reform Committee, told “Fox News Sunday” that Lerner, the former head of the IRS tax-exempt division, would testify before his committee Wednesday, which he said he had been told by her attorney.
That attorney, William W. Taylor, said Issa is wrong. “As of now, she intends to continue to assert her Fifth Amendment rights,” Taylor told POLITICO. “I do not know why Issa said what he said.” (link)
WASHINGTON DC – Former Internal Revenue Service official Lois Lerner, a central figure in the IRS scandal, will appear before Congress Wednesday after refusing to testify last year on the matter, Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., said Sunday.
Issa, chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, told “Fox News Sunday” that Lerner’s lawyers said she will testify before his committee, after saying last week that she would not.
“It’s going to be a good, fact-finding hearing,” he said.
Issa said he didn’t know why Lerner’s lawyers changed their mind, but suggested Lerner testifying was “in her best interest,” considering the recent evidence the committee had gathered.
Issa and Lerner’s attorneys have argued about whether she is protected under the Fifth Amendment from having to testify.
In May 2013, Lerner invoked the amendment right during her first-and-only appearance before the House committee, but only after she professed her innocence during an opening statement. (read more)