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Candidates Take Each Other To Task Over IRS Woes

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By JEREMY WALLACE Sarasota Herald-Tribune

The Tampa Tribune

Published: July 1, 2008

SARASOTA - SARASOTA - Given their own well-documented run-ins with the IRS, one might assume that congressional rivals Vern Buchanan and Christine Jennings would avoid talking about each other's tax problems in their rematch campaign.

Not so.

Both campaigns are showing little hesitation in challenging the other's history of IRS problems. The exchanges illuminate how Buchanan and Jennings are digging in for another scorching campaign for the 13th Congressional District. Two independents are also running.

Buchanan, R-Longboat Key, defeated Jennings, a Sarasota Democrat, in 2006 by 369 votes. Jennings spent more than a year challenging the result, alleging that malfunctioning touch-screen voting machines - since banned in Florida - caused 18,000 votes to go uncounted.

"Because of the nature of the 2006 race, it sets the 2008 race up to be very personal," said Nathan L. Gonzales, a political analyst with the Rothenberg Political Report in Washington, D.C.

The latest exchange between Buchanan and Jennings started two weeks ago after the Herald-Tribune reported that the IRS had filed federal tax liens against two of Buchanan's companies for failing to pay more than $560,000 in employment taxes properly. Those liens, the result of misfiled documents, were withdrawn last week, but not before Jennings went on the attack.

Jennings demanded Buchanan release all of his personal and corporate tax records in light of the tax liens. Buchanan's campaign has refused.

"This latest information about Congressman Buchanan's issues with the IRS is significant because it fits an ongoing pattern of tax and legal problems that is unbecoming of a United States Representative," Melissa Smith, a spokeswoman for Jennings, said.

Buchanan, 57, responded by authorizing the Republican Party of Florida to fire back at Jennings.

"If Jennings has the audacity to request that Congressman Buchanan release his financial records, then she needs to come clean with the voters and assure taxpayers that she will no longer steal from their pockets to fund her campaign," said Erin VanSickle, a spokeswoman for the state GOP.

Jennings, 62, had to pay the IRS about $80,000 in 2007 for back taxes and penalties for failing to file her own unemployment taxes properly on her two previous campaigns for Congress.

Accusing Jennings of stealing may sound severe, but Buchanan himself has faced similar accusations. In the 2006 primary, Republican Tramm Hudson sent out mailers labeling Buchanan a "tax cheat" because he fought the IRS for eight years over his 1992 tax bill. In those mailers, Hudson said, "It's almost as if he stole all that money from law abiding citizens who pay their taxes."

Buchanan's then-campaign manager Tommy Hopper said at the time that Hudson's interpretation of Buchanan's tax issues was "over the top."

Buchanan has said he originally sent in a $1.2 million check for his 1992 taxes, but the IRS sent it back and said he owed more. Buchanan said he decided to dispute the IRS' claim that he owed another $1 million in taxes.

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