with in their name were approved in .
IRS targets conservative groups
The IRS grants tax-exempt status to 40,000 nonprofit groups per year. When the IRS began targeting conservative groups' applications in 2011, nonprofit approvals for groups with
tea party or 9-12 in their name stopped entirely. Five groups with those names had been approved in 2009 and 2010, but zero were approved in 2011. After policy reconsideration in 2012, the backlog was broken and 27 groups were approved, mostly in the second half of the year.
The slowdown was evident with other conservative-sounding groups, as well. Thirty-seven groups with the words patriot or constitution had been approved in 2009 and 2010, but only 10 were approved in 2011. Once again, the backlog was relieved in 2012 with 29 approvals.
On the other hand, groups with the word progressive in their names suffered no similar slowdown pattern. The number of approvals increased each year from 17 in 2009 to 20 in 2012. Read related article.
Approvals each year
Hover over the bars to see how many groups of each name type were approved since 2009.
No 9-12 groups approved in 2011.
No tea party groups approved in 2011.
SOURCE: Post analysis of the IRS public database of nonprofit organizations.
Notes: Groups with names that include both tea party and patriot were included in the tea party group. The 9-12 movement was started by commentator Glen Beck in March 2009. No groups with the 9-12 names were approved that year.
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