By Paul Jossey
As the Center for Competitive Politics commented, the simplest solution is to have the IRS categorize Section 527 groups as those determined by the FEC (or similar state commissions) to be ‘political committees’ i.e. those whose “major purpose” is the nomination or election of candidates. It could then classify the rest under Section 501(c)(4).
This solution would relieve the tax agency of the burdensome task of parsing “issue discussion and advocacy of a political result” on the one hand and the express advocacy of candidate support or opposition on the other. The FEC, having been a party to all major litigation in this area since 1976’s seminal Buckley v. Valeo, is uniquely positioned to make those esoteric determinations with a view toward First Amendment privacy concerns.
