The IRS has been reading "exclusively" as "primarily" since 1959, and by doing so they made IRS workers become judges and investigators of political activity. IRS employees were then forced to evaluate just how political a given 501(c)(4) organization might be. Since the Citizens United SCOTUS ruling, many groups are popping up wanting to keep their donor lists secret while influencing political campaigns, which are now always ongoing. The solution is to revert to the original law, still on the books, which requires these groups to be operated exclusively for the promotion of social welfare. The IRS does not want to be in the business of defining which group is doing political activity and which is not, nor does the public want this to continue.



