Gary Johnson, 2012 Libertarian Party presidential candidate and former Republican governor of New Mexico, says the IRS should be abolished in light of recent scandals, reports Watchdog.
Johnson’s call for abolition comes at a time when continued revelations are only making things look worse for the federal agency.
Not only has the IRS repeatedly maintained that potentially incriminating emails have been irretrievably lost, but a new development revealed that IRS official Lois Lerner had discussed strategies with employees on how to communicate over email in such a way as to avoid congressional inquiries. In spite of IRS evasive maneuvers, a federal judge last Thursday ordered the IRS to come up with an explanation for the emails that have supposedly vanished.
Went interviewed about the recent developments of the IRS scandal, Johnson remained nonplussed.
“None of it surprises me,” Johnson said. “To a higher degree or a lesser degree this is what happens when you have bureaucrats in charge that can manipulate the system any way they so choose.”
“Come on, loss of emails? Give me a break,” Johnson added. “If that doesn’t outrage anybody who looks at this, then you’re out to lunch.”
This isn’t the first time Johnson has called to abolish the IRS wholesale. In 2009, after meeting with several economists, Johnson proposed that the federal government eliminate the income tax, the corporate tax, and to replace them with a single federal consumption tax, if necessary. As opposed to an income tax, a consumption tax applies only when a good or service is purchased.
Now, five years later, Johnson is pushing for the adoption of Fair Tax legislation as a good starting point, noting that around 80 members of Congress support the proposal. For Johnson, despite worries of federal government funding shortfalls, removing the corporate tax would encourage economic growth.
“Why would any company, anywhere in the world, locate anywhere but the United States, given zero corporate tax?” Johnson said. “The entire world will change their tax structure to emulate no income tax, no corporate tax, no more filing.”
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