Interesting Rick Warren tidbit from The Nation

[tbyg52]

I'd sure like more information on this. The bare facts are pretty startling.

How much clout does Rick Warren have?

The California megachurch minister and opponent of gay marriage who will deliver the invocation at Barack Obama's inauguration had his income tax returns audited in 1996. When the IRS tried to collect the taxes it claimed he owed, Warren went to court. Congress then passed a law granting Warren's tax deduction, pre-empting the US Court of Appeals from even taking up the case against him. The votes in the House and Senate were unanimous.

snip

But before the three-judge panel could rule, either on the IRS effort to collect back taxes from Warren or on Chemerinsky's broader argument for declaring the entire exemption unconstitutional, Congress stepped in--and acted with "almost miraculous" speed, as Richard Hammar, editor of the Church Law & Tax Report newsletter, explained to the New York Times. The new law granted Warren his deductions (along with any other clergy who had done the same--although Warren was the only one to end up in court). Congress also put into law, from that time forward, the IRS's "fair rental value" rule.

The Clergy Housing Allowance Clarification Act of 2002 was approved unanimously by Congress, then signed into law by George W. Bush on May 20, 2002, rendering the IRS case against Warren moot. "I have filed hundreds of briefs in federal courts," Chemerinsky told me, "and this is the only time that Congress passed a law to make a specific pending case moot." He added, "It is very rare for Congress to pass a law to make a pending case moot before there was a decision."

More:
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20090202/wiener

[BrklynLiberal]

1. Sure is worth looking into. Sounds like a political move to assuage the fundies.

[katandmoon]

2. So the rest of us subsidize him and other clergy who don't pay their income taxes

Like the rest of us who have to justify our deductions if the IRS comes after us.

Must be nice.

[Ocracoker16]

3. every day I find out something shocking about him

Did the Obama inaugural team do their homework before choosing him for the invocation? Obama was very serious about vetting his appointees, but apparently with Rick Warren he just took it on faith.

Thanks for posting this information. Warren obviously pulled some strings to get all these deductions that should not have been created for him. Maybe the new administration will look at the situation and make him pay everything he owed. I have never heard of a tax deduction for people who seek to strip GLBT folks of their rights and commit other hateful acts.