Political Activities Compliance Initiative

The IRS announced its Political Activities Compliance Initiative (PACI) once again will be in effect for the 2008 election season. The PACI program seeks to educate section 501(c)(3) organizations such as charities and churches about the federal law concerning political campaign activity and to enforce the law in this area.

Political Campaign Activities of Exempt Organizations

Revenue Ruling 2007-41 provides guidelines for exempt organizations on the scope of the the tax law prohibition of campaign activities by section 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organizations. The ruling sets out 21 factual situations involving 501(c)(3) organizations, including churches, and activities that may be prohibited campaign intervention. In each situation, the ruling applies tax law and regulations and concludes that prohibited political activity has or has not occurred.
The IRS also released its Report on the Political Activity Compliance Initiative for the 2006 election cycle. This report, PACI 2006, follows the report on prohibited political intervention in the 2004 election cycle, which was issued in February 2006.
Links:
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-drop/rr-07-41.pdf
http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-tege/2006paci_report_5-30-07.pdf
IRS Reports on Political Activity Compliance Initiative (2004)