IRS placed $240K lien on state Rep. Griffey’s home

The saga of freshman Rep. Bruce Griffey (R-Paris) unsuccessfully trying to pressure first-year Gov. Bill Lee into appointing his wife, Rebecca, to a vacant judgeship is the subject of this week’s Tennessee Journal. The Associated Press has done a fine job following up on the story as well.

Griffey wrote to a top Lee adviser that choosing his wife would have several potential benefits for the governor: making an “automatic ally” out of the lawmaker and taking Rebecca Griffey “out of state politics.” If she didn’t get the job, he mused, “what do Rebecca and I have to lose?”

Rebecca Griffey didn’t make the list of three finalists for the position and Lee ultimately chose Huntingdon attorney Jennifer King for the post. But she quit after just nine days on the bench under what she described as political pressure and maneuvering by the Griffeys and their allies.

Bruce Griffey alleged a political conspiracy against him and his wife by the Trial Court Vacancy Commission, with a sympathetic story in the Tennessee Star claiming the panel was made up of appointees of former Gov. Bill Haslam. It isn’t. The commission is entirely appointed by the speakers of the state House and Senate.

During interviews of the candidates for the job, members of the panel took particular issue with Rebecca Griffey’s answer to a question on her application that she had not had a tax lien or other collection procedure instituted against her over the previous five years. Members of the panel had been given a copy of IRS notices indicating Griffey and her husband had a lien placed on their home for failing to pay $240,060 in 2015 and another $23,030 in 2016.