( D. C. Visit, continued from page 1)
Darrell Issa ' s House Oversight Committee Hearing on Wednesday, the 22nd, to convey our TPM ordeal to the committee tasked to investigate the improper conduct of IRS employees who had engaged in these " targeting " activities. Because John Kerr and I had already spoken about the possibility that this might occur, I suggested that both of us would be willing to participate and Keli accepted the offer. While the trip was hastily arranged and our travel to and fro included long delays in connecting cities,( Memphis going, and D. C. and Minneapolis returning) due to weather-related " handovers " from the tornado that had just devastated Moore, Oklahoma, we had a wonderful and life-changing experience. After checking into our hotel that evening around 7:00PM, we received a message that we were to meet with Jenny Beth Martin, Co-Founder and National Coordinator of Tea Party Patriots at another hotel nearby at 8:00PM. We walked over and met Jenny Beth who had arranged for us and other Tea Party leaders to be interviewed by The Wall Street Journal Senior Special Writer, Monica Langley, who was working on a piece that would put a " public face " on the matter that will appear the in the WSJ late in the week of 5 / 27 / 2013 or in the Weekend Journal on 6 / 1 / 2013. We finished up around midnight and returned to our hotel-- exhausted from the long day, but exhilarated by our involvement in such an important issue that will now be thoroughly exposed. The next morning we were up early and on our way to the Rayburn Building to attend the hearings. Because seating is limited and the lines start forming at 4:30AM, TPP actually hires people to stand in line until their folks arrive at 9:00AM--so John and I were at the front of the line. We were also among the few non-politician, political staffers, journalists / photographers / videographers allowed in the hearing room and were able to observe the entire proceedings from 9:30AM ' til 1:00PM( the committee actually adjourned around 1:30PM). Because the session ran long, we were asked to met at 1:15PM with the committee ' s senior staffers to brief them relative to our experience and transmit the key correspondence and questionnaires that were exchanged between TPM / HTP and the IRS. That meeting lasted ' til 2:30PM and involved other leaders from Tea Party groups from New Jersey, Colorado, Tennessee, Texas, and Pennsylvania, all of whom had very similar stories to relate and documents to transmit. The staff asked if we would be willing to return to appear before the committee at a later date, and we all committed to do so. The next day, Thursday May 23rd, we were to have met with the Senate Committee that is looking into the matter, as well. But, as we soon discovered, most of D. C. starts the beginning of a long weekend( in this case Memorial Day) by leaving town on Thursday, so John and I were at loose ends. Deciding to make the most of our time, we hastily arranged meetings with our Congressmen;
( me with David Schweikert,( R) AZ 6th District and John with Paul Gosar,( R) AZ 4th District) to explain why we were there and tell the TPM / HTP story. Both were extremely interested--Schweikert gave us 45 minutes and Gosar, who is a sitting member of the House Oversight Committee and was in the room Wednesday asking probing questions of the witnesses, allowed us 20 minutes,
TPM Past President John Kerr in Washington D. C.
even though he was between meetings. Both gentlemen agreed that this was a very important issue and one that would not disappear soon and almost certainly involved the very highest levels of the administration. We came away from those brief meetings with a sense that our representatives do care and will follow this story to its eventual conclusion, putting proper measures in place to ensure that this does not happen again. The rest of our time that Thursday was involved in seeing the sights, touring the Capitol Building and the Library of Congress before hailing a cab to the airport for our return
( Continued on page 3)
Pono Press, June 2013, Page 2