(New York) In 2019, an anonymous whistleblower’s accusations about Ukraine led to the first impeachment proceedings against Donald Trump.
Almost four years later, allegations by self-identified whistleblower Gary Shapley could lead to the first impeachment proceedings against a member of the Biden administration.
“If what the IRS whistleblower says [Internal Revenue Service] turns out, we’re going to start an impeachment inquiry against the attorney general,” Kevin McCarthy, Speaker of the House of Representatives, told Fox News last Monday.
But Merrick Garland is not the only person to be targeted by the accusations of Gary Shapley, former supervisor of the US tax investigation into the affairs of Hunter Biden.
Joe Biden also risks being splashed by this affair, as Donald Trump wanted by pressuring his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelensky, during a telephone call to announce an investigation into his Democratic rival.
What does Gary Shapley say? Last May, in closed testimony before a House House committee, he made a series of explosive allegations about the Justice Department’s investigation into Hunter Biden, opened under Donald Trump, in 2018, and since entrusted to David Weiss, United States Attorney in Delaware.
PHOTO EVELYN HOCKSTEIN, REUTERS ARCHIVES
United States Attorney General Merrick Garland
According to the transcript of his testimony published on June 22, Gary Shapley notably accused Merrick Garland of having lied to Congress by asserting that David Weiss had full power to initiate proceedings against Hunter Biden.
In fact, according to the whistleblower, David Weiss claimed the opposite in a meeting held on October 7, 2022. In the presence of FBI and IRS investigators, he allegedly claimed to have been snubbed by leading prosecutors federal authorities in Los Angeles and Washington when he raised the possibility of indicting the president’s son in those jurisdictions.
According to the whistleblower, Weiss also said he had unsuccessfully applied for special prosecutor status, which would have allowed him to override the objections of prosecutors in Los Angeles and Washington.
Merrick Garland and David Weiss have denied this version of events. Others have attributed all of Gary Shapley’s denunciations to misunderstandings or frequent differences in perspective between investigators and prosecutors.
Preferential treatment
But another anonymous IRS whistleblower confirmed Gary Shapley’s testimony. And House Republicans want to interview other witnesses from the October 7, 2022 meeting to get further corroboration.
In the meantime, one fact is indisputable: on June 20, Hunter Biden agreed to plead guilty to two minor tax offenses as part of an agreement with the Department of Justice. Republicans immediately denounced preferential treatment.
Gary Shapley believes that this preferential treatment for Hunter Biden is not new. And he adds that his reporting of the situation to congressional investigators cost him a promotion to the IRS.
“The most serious charges have been dismissed,” he said last Wednesday on Fox News.
The whistleblower argued that Hunter Biden could have been charged with tax evasion, among other things, for failing to report income Ukrainian energy company Burisma paid him in 2014, when the son of the then vice-president -president began to sit on its board of directors. Until 2019, Burisma paid Hunter Biden $1 million a year.
Gary Shapley also claimed to have been blocked by the Justice Department from pursuing investigative leads that could lead to Joe Biden.
We weren’t allowed to ask about ‘dad’. We weren’t allowed to ask about the ‘big guy’.
Gary Shapley on Joe Biden, on Fox News
The “big guy” is a reference to an individual mentioned in a 2017 email found on Hunter Biden’s laptop discussing how profits from a deal with a Chinese company would be divided. The “big guy” was to receive “10%”. Republicans believe it is the current president. The latter has always denied having been involved in the affairs of his son.
The policy ruled out
But Hunter Biden did mention his father in a 2017 WhatsApp message sent to a potential Chinese business partner: “I’m sitting here with my father and we would like to understand why the commitment made has not been fulfilled. Tell the manager I’d like to fix this problem now before it gets out of control, and now means tonight. »
Hunter Biden then threatens his interlocutor by promising “that between the man sitting next to me and everyone he knows, and my ability to always hold a grudge, you will regret not following my instructions”.
A few days later, Hunter Biden’s Chinese partner sent him $5 million. Republicans, who recently published this previously unpublished message, see it as proof of an act of extortion involving the president, who was then only a private citizen.
But was Joe Biden really sitting next to his son as this message was written? Did he even know his son was using his name that way?
Hunter Biden’s lawyer blames any references to Joe Biden in his client’s business-related messages to the crack addiction he was suffering from at the time. Gary Shapley acknowledged that some of Hunter Biden’s claims about his father’s involvement were just “wishful thinking”.
Even though he’s a Republican, the whistleblower swears politics has nothing to do with his allegations. It may be true. But that doesn’t prove his claims.