Letter to an IRS Director

[cinepro]

Obi Wan Kenobi, Star Wars, 1976: "That's no moon... it's a space station".
LDS 'church', 2021: 'That's no church... it's a real estate corporation'.

Uh, Star Wars was 1977. Unless you were referring to when they filmed the scene, which would have been May or June of 1976?

[Bought Yahoo]

http://openargs.com/wp-content/uploads/ ... -Final.pdf

Here is the TL:DR

Ensign Peak Advisors, Inc. (EPA) is ostensibly a 501c3 supporting organization to the Corporation of the President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (COP). However, it is functionally not so. Its owned assets under management (OAUM) have grown from $10 billion to ~$101 billion in 22 years without making a single religious, educational or charitable distribution. It has garnered tens of billions of dollars in tax breaks from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) without any activity towards any tax-exempt mission. In addition, it has engaged in two unlawful distributions per its Articles of Incorporation (AOI) and the Internal Revenue Code (IRC). Top COP and EPA leaders have made public statements concerning church finances and reserves that are disingenuous, specious, and false for the purpose of misleading the IRS, church members, and the public because they were afraid of losing their tax-exempt status. Finally, as will be shown, the COP fails a common-sense commensurate test, which should disqualify it and all its supporting organizations—especially EPA—from tax-exempt status.

Specific Grievances:

1) EPA has made 0 religious, educational, or charitable distributions in 22 years.

2) EPA unlawfully distributed $600 million to bail out a for-profit business in violation of EPA’s AOI and of IRS rules.

3) EPA unlawfully distributed $1.4 billion towards a non-legitimate purpose as per EPA’s AOI and per IRS rules.

4) These two distributions may also have been unlawful on the basis that they inured a trustee, who is also the sole proprietor of the COP and ultimate owner of the two for-profit businesses benefited thereby.

5) The COP created EPA intentionally to defraud or evade taxes and to hide the magnitude of its growing assets from the IRS, the COP’s members, and the public.

6) Representations from trustees and directors of the COP and EPA indicate a sustained intent to deceive the IRS, church members, and the public regarding their use (and non-use) of tithing dollars as well as the size and purpose of their reserves; they did benefit from that deceit materially, which is the basis of fraud.

7) Despite any affirmations to the contrary, EPA does not behave as an “integrated auxiliary,” except on paper.

8) EPA is not “charitable” in the generally accepted legal sense.

9) EPA has violated the public trust.

If you understand the law you'll see these are in error.

For example no. 1.EPA funds support the capital requirements in of the church, a religious purpose.

No 2 the bailouts refer to the church investments. That supports the religious purposes. You may disagree but the IRS implicitly agrees by not processing the whistleblower fee provision. Why do you think that is.

[drumdude]

I'm well aware that the LDS church can do as little as scientology does to retain its tax-exempt status.


The bar is incredibly low and the LDS church has taken advantage of it to the tune of about $1,000,000,000,000.

[Bought Yahoo]

You are moron. Really are.

How is the LDS church tax strategy similar to Scientology?

If say the church approach is similar to the Harvard endowment fund. Agree? It doesn't use itself to support local charity.

[Moksha]

How is the LDS church tax strategy similar to Scientology?

Just a guess, but I would say both desire to pay no tax.

If say the church approach is similar to the Harvard endowment fund. Agree? It doesn't use itself to support local charity.

Absolutely. Just because some churches follow a religious code to help the poor does not mean universities or real estate corporations are bound by that so-called "churchy" ethos.

[Bought Yahoo]

How is the LDS church tax strategy similar to Scientology?

Just a guess, but I would say both desire to pay no tax.

If say the church approach is similar to the Harvard endowment fund. Agree? It doesn't use itself to support local charity.

Absolutely. Just because some churches follow a religious code to help the poor does not mean universities or real estate corporations are bound by that so-called "churchy" ethos.

You have no evidence, no examples do you.

EPA is a tax-exempt entity. The law provides that it pay no taxes if it maintains and expends funds for eleemosynary purposes. And EPA does so; the interest earned on the endowment fund is used to support the church's capital programs (religious purposes) and prop up its main capital investments for, again, religious purposes. The fact that the church does not expend money on your favorite cat charities or charities to help the poor in Minnesota does not make EPA's purpose any less lawful. The size of its endowment does not make it less lawful.

Believe me, and I know you don't, had the IRS seen anything wrong with the church's EPA program it would have instituted finders' fee proceedings for the whisteblower. Nothing. And it isn't because the Church is "like Scientology." No proof of that. It isn't that the church is manipulating high government leaders. No proof of that.

EPA is not a "real estate corporation." The sheer size of the fund is staggering and off-putting, but that isn't illegal and it merely means to church has more money to build temples and such.

[drumdude]

You have no idea what you’re talking about. Look up the IRS and Scientology. They can’t do anything even to religions that are provable frauds. The religious exemption is absolutely guaranteed because the IRS is not in the business of determining which religions are legitimate or not.

[Bought Yahoo]

You have no idea what you’re talking about. Look up the IRS and Scientology. They can’t do anything even to religions that are provable frauds. The religious exemption is absolutely guaranteed because the IRS is not in the business of determining which religions are legitimate or not.

God you are a f...g moron. Give me an example where a provable fraud religion gets a religious exemption from paying taxes

[drumdude]

You have no idea what you’re talking about. Look up the IRS and Scientology. They can’t do anything even to religions that are provable frauds. The religious exemption is absolutely guaranteed because the IRS is not in the business of determining which religions are legitimate or not.

God you are a f...g moron. Give me an example where a provable fraud religion gets a religious exemption from paying taxes

S C I E N T O L O G Y

You're as thick as DCP's fanny alger.

[Everybody Wang Chung]

God you are a f...g moron. Give me an example where a provable fraud religion gets a religious exemption from paying taxes

How about Mormonism.