Comer Denounces Hunter Biden’s Attorneys for ‘Witness Intimidation’ of ‘Brave’ IRS Whistleblowers After Reports President’s Son Sought To Have Them Prosecuted

The chairman of the House Oversight Committee, Congressman James Comer, is decrying reported efforts by Hunter Biden’s attorneys to have two Internal Revenue Service agents jailed for testifying before Congress that Mr. Biden received preferential treatment from federal prosecutors probing his tax affairs, illegal gun purchase, and foreign business dealings. The accusation is likely to be a sticking point for Attorney General Garland during his upcoming appearance before Congress and could fuel a greater push for his impeachment.Mr. Comer, who has led the investigation into Mr. Biden and his family for months, has publicly criticized both Mr. Biden’s attorneys and the United States attorney for Delaware, David Weiss, for alleged misconduct during the investigation and the treatment of whistleblowers from the Internal Revenue Service. According to the New York Times, Mr. Weiss — who has since been named special counsel in the criminal investigation into the first son — was not planning to bring charges against Mr. Biden fils until after two IRS whistleblowers, Gary Shapley and Joseph Ziegler, went public with their allegations that Mr. Weiss was being hampered by his superiors at the Department of Justice and that the DOJ grandees were slow-walking and obstructing the probe into Mr. Biden at nearly every step. Most explosively, the Times also reported that Mr. Biden’s attorneys were in contact with DOJ prosecutors seeking to have Messrs. Shapley and Ziegler charged with illegal disclosures of information. “These brave whistleblowers testified under oath and deserve protection,” Mr. Comer said on social media. “This witness intimidation is unacceptable.”The investigations into the Biden family have yielded information about the president’s contact with his son’s business partners, which Mr. Comer has referred to as “an influence-peddling scheme” and “organized crime.” The remarkable disclosures came in spite of what Mr. Comer calls “obstruction like has never been demonstrated in the history of congressional investigations.”“Not only are we being obstructed by the Biden legal team, we’re being obstructed by the Department of Justice,” the chairman told Fox News’s Maria Bartiromo. “We’re being obstructed by the FBI, by the Secret Service, by the IRS, by the Democrats on the House Oversight Committee. And the next question is will we be obstructed by the new Special Counsel David Weiss investigating this.”Mr. Shapley claimed that at an October 7, 2022, meeting with Mr. Weiss and fellow investigators from the IRS, FBI, and Mr. Weiss’s office, the chief prosecutor told attendees that he was “not the deciding official on whether or not charges are filed.” Mr. Shapley testified that at that October meeting, Mr. Weiss also told investigators that he had explicitly requested special counsel status from the Department of Justice but was denied. He also claimed Mr. Weiss asked the United States attorney for the District of Columbia, Matthew Graves, to charge Mr. Biden with tax violations, but that request was denied. On Monday, the House Judiciary Committee and the House Ways and Means Committee announced they had subpoenaed the IRS’s director of field operations, Michael Batdorf, who allegedly received a complaint from Mr. Shapley that Mr. Biden was receiving “preferential treatment” from the DOJ. The Ways and Means Committee requested a transcribed interview with Mr. Batdorf on July 29, a request Mr. Batdorf declined. The committees also subpoenaed an IRS special agent, Darrell Waldon, and two FBI special agents, Thomas Sobocinski and Ryeshia Holley — all of whom were present at the October 7 meeting with Messrs. Shapley and Weiss. “Our duty is to follow the facts wherever they may lead,” the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, Congressman Jason Smith, said in a statement. “Americans deserve to know the truth, especially now that Attorney General Garland has appointed as special counsel the same U.S. Attorney who oversaw Hunter Biden’s sweetheart plea deal and botched the investigation into his alleged tax crimes.”Mr. Garland is likely to be questioned about all of these allegations during his much anticipated testimony before the House Judiciary Committee on September 20. On Monday, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, Congressman Jim Jordan, said Mr. Biden’s legal team was employing “intimidation” tactics to protect their client. “But for the brave IRS whistleblowers, Hunter Biden would have gotten an even better sweetheart deal,” Mr. Jordan said. “And what’s even worse, is that Biden attorneys wanted to prosecute the whistleblowers for speaking up.”Congressional leaders have said in the past that it is likely they would at least open an impeachment inquiry into the attorney general. These allegations are likely to throw more fuel on the impeachment fire, especially after Mr. Garland sits before the Judiciary Committee. On June 26, Speaker McCarthy told Fox News that the House was just days away from beginning the impeachment process against Mr. Garland if a whistleblower’s claim that the Department of Justice interfered with Mr. Weiss’s investigation appeared to be accurate, though that never materialized. “What he is saying and what David Weiss is saying are two different things,” Mr. McCarthy said of Mr. Garland’s insistence that Mr. Weiss had full prosecutorial authority and Mr. Weiss’s insistence that he was geographically limited. “If it comes true what the IRS whistleblower is saying, we’re going to start impeachment inquiries on the attorney general.”

Comer Denounces Hunter Biden’s Attorneys for ‘Witness Intimidation’ of ‘Brave’ IRS Whistleblowers After Reports President’s Son Sought To Have Them Prosecuted

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