Rep. Speier: Lois Lerner Never Waived Her Fifth Amendment Right

FARROW: "This question of whether Lois Lerner is basically a procedural one. It's about whether she said too much when she proclaimed her innocent and then waived her Fifth Amendment rights by doing so. Did she?"
SPEIER: "No, she did not. In fact, 30 legal experts from around the country and different persuasions, from very different law schools opined that she did not somehow abrogate her rights under the Fifth Amendment by professing her innocence. And there are cases on point that have come before the courts before that have obviously come up with the same conclusion. So the question really is --"
FARROW: "Congresswoman, if that's the case, why is it that House lawyers did approve that contempt charge?"
SPEIER: "Well that's what really kind of interesting. That didn't happen until after the actual actions by the chair. And what's supposed to happen is that the chair is supposed to then force her to answer questions and when she refuses to, then she can be held in contempt. He never did that. So it is procedural in nature. But what is missing in all of this is the fact that she was willing to testify if she was given one more week because her attorney had to be out of Washington, D.C. And Chairman Issa refused to give her one more week. So there was this unwillingness to just give her some extra time and she would have testified. So this is all about the circus; this is all about the side show. And the fact that the speaker says this is not going to be that, I think is sending subliminally the message that it will be."
FARROW: "Well if this is just the side show let's talk about the underlying issue. Yesterday the House also voted to urge the department of justice to appoint a special counsel to investigate the IRS scandal and targeting of conservative groups in 2010. What kind of safeguards would you propose to prevent that targeting from happening again?"
SPEIER: "Let's first address the issue of targeting. Progressive groups were targeted and conservative groups were targeted. But how were they targeted? They were targeted to determine whether or not they were spending 51 percent of their time on political activities and if they were, then they would not have been eligible for a 501(c)(4) designation. Ironically, any of these groups could have self-certified under the law and allowed to move forward with anywhere activities -- "
FARROW: "But Congresswoman, in fact when Lois Lerner was asked whether liberal groups were targeted in the same way, she declined to answer the question. She said there's no evidence of that."
SPEIER: "Actually no, the inspector general actually found that there were progressive groups along with conservative groups that were targeted but they were targeted for purposes of trying to evaluate whether or not they were more political than they were social welfare."
FARROW: "Well it does seem seem at the very least the preponderance of groups that were being targeted were in that 2010 period Tea Party affiliated, conservative affiliated groups."