Breitbart News Network, the company founded by the late right-wing agitator Andrew Breitbart, said this week that it is getting audited by the Internal Revenue Service and believes the ordeal is totally political.
The California-based company took its problem to Fox News and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), both of whom did their part to advance the story.
Fox obtained a copy of the IRS audit notice, reporting that the agency “asked for a litany of documents, including logs of its receipts and expenses, but also its partnership agreement and a “written narrative” of the business.”
Cruz, meanwhile, sent a letter on Tuesday to IRS commissioner John Koskinen, expressing “deep concern” that Breitbart News “would be subject to a far-reaching, burdensome, and open-ended audit.”
The situation represents a continuation of a persistent narrative on the right: that the agency has unfairly targeted conservative organizations since President Obama took office.
“For the IRS to behave like a partisan political organization, targeting media organizations whose views differ from the President’s, would represent a gross abuse of power,” Cruz wrote in his letter.
Stephen K. Bannon, executive chairman of Breitbart News, said the “Obama administration’s timing on this is exquisite, but try as they might through various methods to silence us, we will only get more emboldened.”
The company doesn’t seem to mind being at the center of the story.
On Wednesday, the company’s flagship site, Breitbart.com, gave the two most prominent slots on its front page to Cruz’s letter and the story that originally appeared on Fox.
