Right-Wing Think Tank Family Research Council Is Now A Church In Eyes Of The IRS

[LetMyPeopleVote]

The Southern Poverty Law Center list the Family Research Council as a hate group. Someone under TFG's IRS director, this hate group is now considered to be a church.

Link to tweet

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/right-wing-think-tank-family-research-council-church-irs-tony-perkins

The Family Research Council’s multimillion-dollar headquarters sit on G Street in Washington, D.C., just steps from the U.S. Capitol and the White House, a spot ideally situated for its work as a right-wing policy think tank and political pressure group.

From its perch at the heart of the nation’s capital, the FRC has pushed for legislation banning gender-affirming surgery; filed amicus briefs supporting the overturning of Roe v. Wade; and advocated for religious exemptions to civil rights laws. Its longtime head, a former state lawmaker and ordained minister named Tony Perkins, claims credit for pushing the Republican platform rightward over the past two decades.

What is the FRC? Its website sums up the answer to this question in 63 words: “A nonprofit research and educational organization dedicated to articulating and advancing a family-centered philosophy of public life. In addition to providing policy research and analysis for the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of the federal government, FRC seeks to inform the news media, the academic community, business leaders, and the general public about family issues that affect the nation from a biblical worldview.”

In the eyes of the Internal Revenue Service, though, it is also a church, with Perkins as its religious leader.

According to documents obtained via the Freedom of Information Act and given to ProPublica, the FRC filed an application to change its status to an “association of churches,” a designation commonly used by groups with member churches like the Southern Baptist Convention, in March 2020. The agency approved the change a few months later.

The FRC is one of a growing list of activist groups to seek church status, a designation that comes with the ability for an organization to shield itself from financial scrutiny. Once the IRS blessed it as an association of churches, the FRC was no longer required to file a public tax return, known as a Form 990, revealing key staffer salaries, the names of board members and related organizations, large payments to independent contractors and grants the organization has made. Unlike with other charities, IRS investigators can’t initiate an audit on a church unless a high-level Treasury Department official has approved the investigation.

[Takket]

1. well that's just fantastic

we over here on the left are calling for organizations that use "sermons" as political speeches to tell you who to vote for to lose tax exempt status. been screaming for this for year. now we found out that, if anything, the process is actually going BACKWARDS with more political groups being called churches.

Find out who signed off on this.
Fire them.
Retract what they did.

[rubbersole]

5. Yes.

This is such bullshit.

[LetMyPeopleVote]

7. Democrats call on IRS to review right-wing group's 'church' status

The Democrats have to reverse this ruling

Link to tweet

https://www.washingtonpost.com/religion/2022/08/02/family-research-council-irs/

Congressional House Democrats are asking the IRS to review the tax-exempt status of a prominent conservative advocacy group recently reclassified as a church, arguing the organization may be exploiting the designation to avoid scrutiny.

Forty Democratic lawmakers, led by U.S. Reps. Suzan DelBene (Wash.) and Jared Huffman (Calif.), outlined their concerns about the Family Research Council in a letter sent to the head of the IRS and the secretary of the Treasury on Monday. According to a recent report from ProPublica, the FRC successfully applied to be reclassified as a “group of churches” in 2020.

Lawmakers say that while the FRC often appeals to faith and advocates for a “biblical worldview,” the status change “strains credulity” because the group operates primarily as “a political advocacy organization.”.....

In their letter, lawmakers note the benefits of being classified as a church, a legal term that encompasses an array of tax-exempt religious houses of worship. Churches do not have to file 990 forms, which detail the salaries of major staffers and allow for public scrutiny. What’s more, the IRS rarely investigates churches, in part because doing so requires sign-off from a “high-level Treasury official,” the letter pointed out......

In their letter, lawmakers note the benefits of being classified as a church, a legal term that encompasses an array of tax-exempt religious houses of worship. Churches do not have to file 990 forms, which detail the salaries of major staffers and allow for public scrutiny. What’s more, the IRS rarely investigates churches, in part because doing so requires sign-off from a “high-level Treasury official,” the letter pointed out.

[Takket]

8. Bravo! Go get them!!!

[Phoenix61]

2. One form givith another form taketh away. Hopefully someone

there will correct this obvious mistake.

[Deuxcents]

3. The new bill hiring IRS is just in time..

To put an end to this scam

[paleotn]

4. The church of hate.

[LetMyPeopleVote]

6. Dems question Family Research Council's tax status as a 'church'

This hate group should not be treated as a church

Link to tweet

https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/maddowblog/dems-question-family-research-councils-tax-status-church-rcna41736

Secular tax-exempt organizations have to file a specific kind of tax return — a Form 990 — that lists staff salaries, sizable payments, grants, etc.

Churches, however, don’t have to file Form 990s. What’s more, church audits are more difficult and far less common than audits of other tax-exempt institutions.

Whether the Family Research Council actually should be seen as a church, however, is another matter. From the ProPublica report:

Does the organization hold regular chapel services? According to the FRC’s letter to the IRS, the answer is yes. It wrote that it holds services at its office building averaging more than 65 people. But when a ProPublica reporter called to inquire about service times, a staffer who answered the phone responded, “We don’t have church service.” Elsewhere in the form, it says that the employees make up those who attend its services.

With this in mind, Politico reported this week that more than three dozen House Democrats — who collectively are scrutinizing organizations that claim church status to avoid taxes — contacted the Internal Revenue Service about the FRC.

In their letter to the IRS, the lawmakers argued that the Family Research Council “claiming to be a church strains credulity: they do not hold religious services, do not have a congregation or affiliated congregations, and do not possess many of the other attributes of churches listed by the IRS.”