A lawyer for Hunter Biden says an IRS agent broke the law by telling Congress about problems with the agency’s investigation of the troubled first son, a claim the agent’s lawyer called an “unfortunate” attack on his client.
Biden lawyer Chris Clark said in a statement Thursday that “it appears this IRS agent has committed a crime” by “improperly disclos[ing] information about an ongoing tax investigation.” Clark was responding to bombshell claims from a senior IRS special agent who says the Biden Justice Department has stalled an investigation into Biden’s taxes for political reasons. The whistleblower also claims that Attorney General Merrick Garland gave misleading testimony last month when he insisted that the U.S. attorney in Delaware, who has led the Biden probe since 2018, has been allowed to proceed unencumbered.
“It’s really unfortunate that statement was made,” Mark Lytle, a lawyer for the whistleblower, said in response to Clark’s statement. Lytle, a veteran whistleblower attorney, added that his client expected to be attacked for coming forward and that “attacks like [Clark’s] were really what he was worried about.” He said Clark’s statements will likely thwart future whistleblowers from coming forward. “I don’t think it helps whistleblowers as a whole,” Lytle said.
The statement from Biden’s attorney marks a surprising turn for Democrats, who staunchly defended whistleblowers in the Trump administration against attacks on their credibility. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D., Md.), who led impeachment proceedings against former president Donald Trump, said the whistleblower who kicked off that investigation “will go down in history as a hero.”
A report on Thursday appeared to lend some credence to the whistleblower’s claims. According to NBC News, there is “growing frustration” at the FBI because agents finished their Biden investigation a year ago. IRS agents completed their investigation more than a year ago.
Prosecutors have considered four charges against Biden, according to NBC: a felony charge for tax evasion, two misdemeanor tax charges, and a possible felony charge related to Biden’s application for a gun. Delaware U.S. attorney David Weiss has investigated Biden since 2018.
The IRS agent, who has worked at the agency for a decade, is asking Congress for official whistleblower protections to provide more information about the Biden case. Lytle said in a letter to lawmakers this week that the whistleblower has already filed a complaint internally at the IRS, with the Treasury Department’s inspector general, and with the Justice Department’s inspector general.
The White House, which denied the whistleblower’s allegations on Thursday, did not respond to questions about the remarks from Hunter Biden’s lawyer.
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