WASHINGTON –  The wife of the former IRS commissioner who ran the tax agency when it was singling out conservative groups was apparently involved -- at least briefly -- in the Occupy Wall Street movement.
Susan L. Anderson sent a tweet in December 2011 asking people in the Washington area to attend an Occupy Wall Street rally.
Anderson’s active role in promoting OWS is the latest curious detail to emerge as scrutiny focuses on her husband, ex-IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman.
In a Dec. 6 tweet, Anderson, a senior program adviser for the D.C.-based group Public Campaign, tweeted “DC, good morning! Come down to the Mall and tell your 99% story!” as well as a picture of a white tent with a poster on the outside saying, “Story of the 99%. Training Today 830.”
Occupy Wall Street is a movement that began on Sept. 17, 2011 in Manhattan’s Financial District and has grown to more than 100 cities in the U.S. The Occupy rallies sought to bring attention to the disparity among classes in the country, though were also criticized for lacking focus and being unruly. Multiple cities, including D.C., held their own rallies
Anderson’s group, Public Campaign, bills itself as nonpartisan, and states it is working with “a broad range of organizations” to reform campaign-finance rules. However, the group receives much of its funding from such liberal groups as the Ford Foundation, Barbra Streisand’s The Streisand Foundation and Health Care for America NOW, a coalition of labor unions supporting ObamaCare that includes the AFL-CIO and the Service Employees International Union, according to the Public Campaign website.
When the scandal over the IRS’ targeting of conservative groups broke, Public Campaign also appeared to defend the tax agency.
Nick Nyhart, chief executive for Public Campaign, suggested to ABC News that the misdeeds of a “few bad apples” within the agency will “make it harder for those questions to be asked without claims of bias.”
Last month, Shulman faced a tough round of questioning by Congress on the scandal that’s weighed heavily on the federal tax collecting agency. Shulman, who was appointed to his post by President George W. Bush, denied knowing that the agency targeted Tea Party groups between 2010 and 2012. Others have been skeptical about Shulman’s testimony and his knowledge of events.
Recently released reports show that Shulman made more than 100 visits to the White House.