CHARITY SEES POLITICS IN AUDIT

A Texas nonprofit group critical of the campaign spending of Rep. Tom DeLay has been cleared by the Internal Revenue Service after it conducted an audit of the charity following a request from an ally of Mr. DeLay in the House of Representatives, reports The Washington Post. Rep. Sam Johnson raised the possibility to the IRS that the group, Texans for Public Justice, had violated its tax-exempt status after Barnaby W. Zall, a Washington lawyer close to Mr. DeLay, complained to Mr. Johnson, the newspaper said. The charity’s founder, Craig L. McDonald, has alleged that the investigation was political retaliation for the group’s criticisms of Mr. DeLay’s fund raising and campaign spending. An IRS spokesman said, however, that politics do not play a role in how the agency decides which groups to audit.