Carolyn Kaster/AP

Issa's Pet Issue Brings Down an IRS Obamacare Administrator

Officials working on implementation of the Affordable Care Act may have taken improper gifts.

Darrell Issa, please come collect your scalp. It's a valuable one: The guy the IRS put in charge of implementing Obamacare has been placed on leave for taking improper gifts.

The Hill reports:

[T]he staffers – named by one source as Fred Schindler and Donald Toda, who both work on implementation of the Affordable Care Act – received over $1,100 in free food and other gifts at a 2010 California conference that was the centerpiece of a recent Treasury audit, according to information given to congressional investigators.

BuzzFeed's John Stanton indicates that the conference at issue isn't clear:

One congressional source said it also appears the free meals and gifts were accepted at the same 2010 conference during which participants filmed a Star Trek spoof video.

That conference was the subject of an exhaustive audit by the inspector general, which found that it cost $4.1 million. If it wasn't that conference at which Schindler took the improper gifts, it could have been any of the 151 other conferences the agency held that year. In total, the inspector general found that the IRS spent $37.5 million on conferences in 2010.

Read more at Atlantic Wire.