WASHINGTON, March 5 (UPI) -- A federal appeals court in Washington ruled 2-1 Friday the Internal Revenue Service may keep a congressional document from a Ross Perot group.
The Perot-founded group, United We Stand America Inc., had sought all IRS documents that referred to it. When it received no response from a Freedom of Information Act request, the group filed suit in federal court. Though the IRS subsequently sent hundreds of pages of documents to the group in response to the request, it refused to divulge a document prepared for the Joint Committee on Taxation.
The committee had asked the IRS to prepare a report on whether political groups had been singled out for audits.
A federal judge had ruled for the IRS. The appeals court majority said the IRS must turn over all documents to the group except for those "that would reveal the Joint Committee's request."
"The Freedom of Information Act does not cover congressional documents," the court said.
