Polling News: IRS Targeting Intentional To Punish Political Opponents

By Susan Duclos

A Fox News poll finds that 66 percent of Americans believe the IRS targeting of conservatives was intentional to punish political opponents. Only 23 percent of Americans actually bought in to the original administration excuse that it originated with low level employees, which has now been shown to have been a false assertion.

Surprisingly, by a seven percentage-point margin, even Democrats are more likely to believe the targeting was intentional and meant as a punitive measure ordered by higher-ups.

 In addition, most voters continue to believe the Obama administration knew about (40 percent) or was directly involved in (28 percent) the IRS treating conservative groups unfairly. 

This follows the findings of  early June results from the Bloomberg National Poll where 47 percent  of Americans say they don’t believe Obama's explanation that he learned about the IRS targeting his political opponents from media reports.

More from the Fox News Poll:

More than three-quarters of voters (78 percent) want Congress to continue to investigate the IRS.  That’s a bit higher than the number that thinks Congress should continue to investigate the Justice Department seizing journalists’ records (76 percent) and the Obama administration handling of the attacks in Benghazi (73 percent).

Continuing the investigation into the IRS scandal has widespread support: Almost all Republicans (90 percent), as well as sizable majorities of independents (76 percent) and Democrats (69 percent) agree lawmakers should persist until they feel they know the truth.

Gallup's numbers are even worse for the Obama administration, where 59 percent believe IRS officials were aware of the targeting and 50 percent believe Obama was.

A May 20, 2013 Pew Research release found that a plurality, 42 percent, believe the Obama administration was actively involved in the IRS targeting of conservative groups and those numbers rise among Americans that have been following the IRS scandal very or somewhat closely, to 49 percent believing the Obama administration as involved in the decision to target conservatives.

A recent New York Times/CBS News poll found that more believed the Obama administration was involed, than those that didn't.

Sixty-eight percent of respondents- 80 percent of Republicans, 60 percent of Democrats and 66 percent of independents - said they think the IRS targeting was motivated by politics, rather than adherence to the tax code policy. But while forty-four percent think the Obama administration had a hand in the targeting, 40 percent said they believe the agency acted on its own.

Multiple polls from a variety of organizations all confirm that Americans aren't as gullible as the Obama administration thought they were.

Full Wake up America coverage on the IRS scandal can be found here.