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href="http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/09/02/pastors-for-peace-close-to-losing-tax-exempt-status-courtesy-of-irs-assault/"
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<h1 id="reader-title">Pastors for Peace Close to Losing Tax
Exempt Status Courtesy of IRS Assault</h1>
<div id="reader-credits" class="credits">by <span
class="post_author" itemprop="author"><a
href="http://www.counterpunch.org/author/gaguwe/"
rel="nofollow">W. T. Whitney</a> - September 2, 2016<br>
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<p>Gail Walker is the executive director of IFCO/Pastors
for Peace with offices in New York City. In an interview
she gave which appeared August 29 as the lead posting on
the prominent Cuban website Cubadebate.cu, Walker
described apparent U. S. government persecution of the
human- rights organization founded and headed by Rev.
Lucius Walker, Gail Walker’s father, who died in 2010.
In fact, the U.S. government over the course of five
years has moved toward removing the tax-exempt and
non-profit status Pastors for Peace and its parent
organization IFCO have enjoyed since IFCO’s founding in
1967.</p>
<p>Introducing Walker, journalist Rosa Miriam Elizalde
noted that, “In spite of the many times attempts were
made at the Mexican border to block its humanitarian
cargo on the way to Cuba, Pastors for Peace has
maintained its caravans to Cuba uninterruptedly since
1992, including during the darkest years of the Bush
administration.”</p>
<p>She reported that Pastors for Peace “yellow buses”
still travel the streets of Cuban cities and that
“hospitals and schools [in Cuba] have benefited for
years” from aid brought on those buses to Cuba. Pastors
of Peace volunteers traveling on the buses through the
United States have informed “people about the
consequences of sanctions directed at making the Cuban
people surrender through a lack of food and medicines.”</p>
<p>Bringing their humanitarian aid material to Cuba,
riders on the buses violated U.S. rules governing the
blockade. They did so purposefully as a matter of civil
disobedience.</p>
<p>Elizalde pointed out that: “Until the last moment of
his life, the Reverend Lucius Walker … dedicated a good
part of his energies to correcting the injustice of his
government. In interviews, he always repeated that his
object was to win hearts and minds in the United States
to the Cuban people. Just before his death in September,
2010 he called upon President Obama to act on his
election-campaign promise to re-establish U. S.
relations with Cuba.”</p>
<p>For her part, Gail Walker confessed to surprise at the
assault by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS),
especially in view of President Obama’s role in
advancing a “process toward normalizations of
relations,” his trip to Cuba, and his “declaration that
North American policy toward the island had failed.” She
added that. “President Obama has called for an end to
the blockade.’”</p>
<p>She expected that “the President would respect the work
of IFCO/Pastors for Peace, that for a quarter of a
century has organized friendship caravans as an
expression of love and solidarity with the [Cuban]
people and in opposition to the blockade.”</p>
<p>By way of explanation, Walker observed that “inside the
United States, a campaign still persists whose purpose
is to undermine Cuba and its revolutionary principles.
IFCO/Pastors for Peace has always embraced the
commitment of Cuban leaders to put the welfare of their
people first. That’s why we continue … calling upon the
U. S. government to end its efforts towards ‘regime
change.’”</p>
<p>In her interview, Gail Walker described IFCO/Pastors
for Peace humanitarian caravans to Central America and
the Caribbean area and the group’s work with minority
youth in U.S. prisons, victimized cross-border migrants,
and in preparing young community organizers.</p>
<p>The IFCO/Pastors for Peace website describes a
five-year IRS process of investigation and accusations.
Alerted by Representatives Brad Sherman (D-CA) and Sue
Myrick (R-NC), the IRS in 2011 alleged that support for
the legitimate charitable organization Viva Palestina
had morphed into backing for the supposed terrorist
group Hamas.</p>
<p>Pastors for Peace successfully appealed that charge,
only to be accused of violating the U. S. “Trading with
the Enemy Act” when it extended friendship to Cuba and
brought aid material. That charge fell to an appeal
based on the reality that the Treasury Department’s
Office of Foreign Assets Control, responsible for
enforcing the blockade, had never moved to prosecute
Pastors for Peace.</p>
<p>The charge of sloppy record-keeping followed. In an
e-mail September 1, IFCO/Pastors for Peace reported,
“They denied our latest appeal. The IRS tried
Islamophobia! Their case didn’t hold water! Then, the
IRS tried attacking our Cuba work [and] they’ve dropped
that one. SO NOW, the IRS is coming after us for our
‘record keeping.’” The group’s website displays examples
of what looks like more than adequate documentation
accompanying aid material on its way to Cuba.</p>
<p>Gail Walker spoke of potential damage, if the U.S.
government has its way. Pastors for Peace will be paying
taxes on donations, the group’s sole source of income.
Donors, having lost their tax exemption, may no longer
give, or may give less. And “the projects we fiscally
sponsor will have to look for other sponsors whose tax
free status is intact.”</p>
<p>“How ironic, cruel, and petty,” observed the National
Network on Cuba, “that that the U.S. Government has
focused on destroying a religious organization whose
mission is to act in love and the spirit of community.”
Other advocates of non-interventionist U. S. relations
with Cuba see persecution of IFCO/Pastors for Peace as a
wet blanket on efforts toward normalization of
bi-national relations, among them Steve Burke. That
member of the Let Cuba Live Committee of Maine is “leery
of [President] Obama’s claim the United States wants
friendship with Cuba.”</p>
<p>Judy Robbins, also of Maine, said that, “After years of
steady progress, hard-earned gains, and the beginnings
of something like normal, here comes the IRS to
vindictively try to dismantle one of the most successful
and admired efforts in this long campaign.” Robbins
joins Gail Walker in urging that one and all sign the <a
href="https://www.change.org/p/do-not-remove-ifco-pastors-for-peace-non-profit-tax-status%3E">petition
accessible here</a>.</p>
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<p class="author_description"> <em><strong>W.T. Whitney Jr.</strong> is
a retired pediatrician and political journalist living
in Maine.</em> </p>
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