Emails reveal IRS official Lois Lerner called conservatives 'crazies' and 'a**holes' as Eric Holder comes under new pressure to investigate

Lerner slammed right-of-center Americans in an email to a colleague in 2012, seven months before the tea-party targeting scandal broke

'Maybe we are through if there are that many a**holes,' she wrote, responding to a comment about conservative talk radio programs

'We don't need to worry about [illegal] alien terrorists,' she snarked: 'It's our own crazies that will take us down'

Lerner presided over years of alleged partisan discrimination against conservative groups that applied for nonprofit tax benefits



For mer senior IRS official Lois Lerner had deeply held political biases while she was in a position of authority, according to Republican lawmakers who unveiled emails on Wednesday showing her referring to conservatives as 'crazies' and 'a**holes.'

Michigan Rep. Dave Camp, who chairs the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, wrote to Attorney General Eric Holder to demand what he called 'a serious investigation' – something he said has been lacking.

Camp wants Holder to appoint an outside special counsel to probe the culture of the IRS and explain why hundreds of conservative groups were subjected to intrusive questioning and years-long delays when they applied for nonprofit tax benefits – steps that were not taken against liberal organizations.

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Former IRS official Lois Lerner won't be charged with a crime for her role in the agency's targeting of conservative groups for their political beliefs beginning in 2010

He told the attorney general on Wednesday that the newly disclosed email correspondence 'shows Ms. Lerner's mistreatment of conservative groups was driven by her personal hostility toward conservatives.'

The November 9, 2012 email exchange with an unnamed colleague – the person's name was redacted in the copy Camp's staff released publicly – took place while Lerner was in the United Kingdom.

'Overheard some ladies talking about American[s] today,' Lerner wrote. 'According to them we've bankrupted ourselves and a[re] through. We'll never be able to pay off our debt and are going down the tubes.'

Turning sarcastic, Lerner pounced on her British acquaintances.



'They don't seem to see that they can't afford to keep up their welfare state either,' she wrote. 'Strange.'



The conversation turned ugly when Lerner's writing companion let loose first on conservatives.



'Well, you should hear the whacko wing of the GOP,' the person replied. 'The US is through; too many foreigners sucking the teat; time to hunker down, buy ammo and food, and prepare for the end.'

'The right wing radio shows are scary to listen to.'

'Great,' Lerner wrote back. 'Maybe we are through if there are that many a**holes.'

'And I'm talking about the hosts of the shows,' came the reply. 'The callers are rabid.'

In the final message of the exchange, Lerner wrote that 'we don't need to worry about [illegal] alien terrorists. It's our own crazies that will take us down.'

Lerner's visit to the UK coincided with a management shakeup at the IRS. On the day of the email exchange, then-IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman left office at the conclusion of his appointed term and deputy commissioner Steven Miller took over.

Foot-dragging: Camp says Attorney General Eric Holder hasn't undertaken a serious investigation of Lerner and the Obama administration's IRS

Miller would resign seven months later after the tea party scandal broke wide open and President Obama pledged publicly to 'hold the responsible parties accountable.

'I’ll do everything in my power to make sure nothing like this happens again,' Obama said.

In England months earlier, Lerner emailed of a Friday morning meeting with 'internal "spooks"' in an unnamed government agency. Then she took some leisure time.

'Ha[d] work this morning. Got to talk to their internal "spooks",' she wrote.

I was going to take the train to windsor Castle, but stuff closes early in winter so it wasn't going to work. Instead, went [to] Hempstead –an Edwardian English village, full of beautiful, huge houses – which have been ruined by letting the hoi paloi [sic] live there! These people have ruined everything with their equality push!'

'Tonight [I'm] going to a movie and dinner with [redacted] and her partner. Tomorrow at 8am, I get on a tour bus to go to Windsor Castle, Stonehenge and Oxford (or is it Cambridge?). Figured I may never get the chance otherwise and have always wanted to see Stonehenge.'

'Then,' she added, 'hopefully a nice dinner and bed to be ready for the trip home. Am being good --no shopping. Everything is super expensive even if the dollar and pound were equal. See you soon.'

Lerner pleaded the Fifth Amendment twice in 2013 and 2014 in House hearings, refuding to answer questions about her role in targeting conservative groups on the basis of words like 'tea party' and 'patriots' in their names.

After determining that she had waived that right by making a self-serving opening statement, House Republicans carried a vote to find her in contempt of Congress and referred her to the Justice Department for prosecution.