Thread by @tristanleavitt

🧵@WaysandMeansGOP voted to release all these IRS whistleblower documents pursuant to its legal authority under 26 USC 6103. Some items to point your attention to regarding the investigation... waysandmeans.house.gov/event/meeting-…

@WaysandMeansGOP ➡️The FBI Form 302 summarizing its March 28, 2019 interview with Gal Luft. gop-waysandmeans.house.gov/wp-content/upl…

@WaysandMeansGOP ➡️ A month before AUSA Wolf told investigators she thought they should give up on the search warrant for BlueStar Strategies, she told them during the drafting process that the proposed search warrant should have nothing in it about "Political Figure 1" (Pres. Biden).

@WaysandMeansGOP ➡️ SSA Shapley previously described the FBI asking the prosecution team on 9/21/20 if they could cut the investigation down to just 5 interviews. SSA Shapley's memorandum of this call has now been released: gop-waysandmeans.house.gov/wp-content/upl…

@WaysandMeansGOP ➡️ Before AUSA Wolf even received the October 23, 2020 briefing on the confidential human source FD-1023 (later released by Grassley), she had already pre-judged it. This info further undermines @RepRaskin's claim that the Biden bribery allegations were fully investigated.

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin Pittsburgh reportedly found this info was *not* disinformation. But no wonder that just 6 weeks later Wolf told investigators (who didn't know about the bribery allegations) they couldn't ask about Joe Biden because there was "no specific criminality to that line of questioning."

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin Critics will no doubt argue that AUSA Wolf being "ordered" by the Principal Deputy Attorney General to receive the briefing somehow shows the Barr DOJ interfering. But Wolf was Hunter Biden's firewall. (Here rejecting the request to search HB's residence despite probable cause.)

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin ➡️ Long before IRS SAC Waldon refused to answer Congress's questions about the storage unit that AUSA Wolf tipped HB's lawyers off about, Waldon's predecessor SAC was talking with IRS-CI leadership about his frustration with the Delaware USAO's not allowing that search warrant.

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin SSA Shapley's Significant Case Report to his chain of command for that month of Dec. 2020 contained the type of information US Atty Weiss was no doubt unhappy to later read, leading to his retaliation against SSA Shapley.

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin ➡️ IRS investigators learned in Sep. 2021 from @CNN that they had "an email from Hunter saying he expected all this 'stuff' to go away when his dad becomes President." gop-waysandmeans.house.gov/wp-content/upl…

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin @CNN ➡️ SSA Shapley's May 2021 report highlighted that AUSA Wolf "did not want any of the agents to look into the allegation" regarding campaign finance violations. She "does not want to include their Public Integrity Unit because they would take authority away from her."

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin @CNN By 1/12/22, as the IRS charging recommendations were being finalized, SSA Shapley recorded that AUSA Wolf again said "she is not 'personally' interested in pursuing" the campaign finance case, and again indicated working with Public Integrity was just "more levels of approval."

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin @CNN ➡️ It's a big deal that U.S. Attorney Matt Graves declined to bring a case against HB after the WH announced on 3/31/22 Pres. Biden didn't think his son had done anything wrong. This statement from the WH added to an already clear conflict of interest. whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/…

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin @CNN Graves should have recused himself as a presidential appointee. But the WH spokesperson's timing may have influenced Graves overruling his career First Assistant, who had told DOJ Tax Division they were optimistic about the case against HB and would assign an AUSA of their own.

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin @CNN I've already shared a 🧵 here on the chain of events the White House's 3/31/22 statement kicked off, particularly AG Garland being grilled by Senator Hagerty on 4/26/22: .x.com/tristanleavitt…

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin @CNN ➡️ The timeline in Sep. 2022, when the HB case was presented in the Central District of California, is also illuminating. Recall SSA Shapley's testimony that prosecutors seemed to delay the California case until U.S. Attorney Martin Estrada (a Kamala Harris donor) was confirmed.

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin @CNN What has previously gone unnoticed is the timeline of public events in this period. On 9/18/22 Pres. Biden was interviewed on 60 Minutes and (incorrectly) said HB's troubles had caused no conflict for the government. cbsnews.com/news/president…

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin @CNN Estrada was sworn in on 3/19/22--the day after Pres. Biden's 60 Minutes interview. That same day, 33 Republican Senators wrote to AG Garland asking that he give U.S. Attorney Weiss special counsel authorities to avoid political conflicts of interest. cornyn.senate.gov/wp-content/upl…

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin @CNN The letter noted apparent FBI whistleblowers had notified Senator Grassley of "a widespread effort within the FBI to downplay or discredit negative information about" Hunter Biden. Other FBI allegations about investigative avenues being shut down would mirror later IRS claims.

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin @CNN (No doubt AUSA Wolf read this part of the letter with interest, as she was the chief obstructor in the Delaware U.S. Attorney's Office.)

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin @CNN Ultimately, the Senators asked that Weiss be appointed special counsel to "avoid the appearance of impropriety, and provide additional assurances to the American people that the Hunter Biden investigation is free from political influence."

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin @CNN (Sorry, noticed typo above--Estrada was sworn in on *9/19/22*.) Coverage around this letter was the backdrop when SSA Shapley emailed U.S. Attorney Weiss on 9/20/22 to request a discussion, which ultimately came to fruition with the much-discussed 10/7/22 meeting.

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin @CNN Then in a 9/22/22 team call, prosecutors revealed 1) that USA Estrada was not recusing himself from this case, 2) that the case would be delayed while he reviewed it, and 3) that DOJ Tax had not yet taken an official position allowing charges to move *without* the local USA.

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin @CNN At the end of the call, prosecutors announced they'd decided to wait until after the election to charge anyway. AUSA Wolf made the infamous comment SSA Shapley shared in his prior interview: "Why should we shoot ourselves in the foot by charging before the election?"

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin @CNN Unbeknownst to the 33 Senators who'd written about the case, not only was DOJ Tax calling many of the shots, and not only was the case being presented to a Biden appointee in CA like it had in DC earlier, but *even within Delaware* decisions were being made for political reasons.

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin @CNN This led SSA Shapley to immediately notify DFO Batdorf of the "continued inappropriate decisions affecting timing" and write to his full chain of command: "The statement [itself] is inappropriate let alone the actual action of delaying as a result of the election."

FBI ASAC Ryeshia Holley requested delaying the Weiss meeting until SSA Shapley could attend, and sometime in this period Shapley went to the FBI's Baltimore Field Office to meet with Holley about the investigators' many problems with how the DE USAO was handling the case.

Meanwhile, on 9/28/22 IRS SAC Waldon separately requested meetings with both US Atty Weiss and DOJ Tax's Jason Poole. The next day, on 9/29/22 (the same day Ziegler was interviewing James Biden), Waldon called to say the Hunter Biden indictment would be delayed until *2023*.

@WaysandMeansGOP @RepRaskin @CNN Shapley and Holley again confirmed before the 10/7/22 meeting that the DE USAO's repeated delays and questions about venue were top priorities to raise in the meeting with USA Weiss. Shapley also added the special counsel issue, raised just two weeks earlier in the Senate letter.

Even *the day before the 10/7/22 meeting*, US Atty Weiss asked someone in his office what SA Ziegler had said "regarding the call [he] received from management after the James Biden meeting." That DOJ Tax's decision to delay until 2023 was only percolating to DE prosecutors in this disjointed manner highlights that it must have been pretty clear to Weiss that he was "not the deciding person" in this case.

@WaysandMeansGOP has now released the full text of SSA Shapley's 10/7/22 notes, which show a contemporaneous record of Weiss saying:
- "He is not the deciding person";
- Venue - have to go to D.C. 14/15/16;
- Tax process: If approved -- Tax will grant discretion/not approve;
- CA USA Estrada in charge of authorizing those charges in that jurisdiction;
- Weiss requested special counsel status in D.C.;
- Main DOJ said "no" -- follow the process; and
- If CA USA says no
-- Weiss will request approval to proceed in CA.

This is simply not consistent with the statements of someone who believed on 10/7/22 he had "ultimate authority over this matter"--at least not in the way DOJ has tried to use that phrase as a shield to obscure all of the other individuals who, "consistent with...the Principles of Federal Prosecution and Departmental regulations" played a role in approving (or DIS-approving) charges against Hunter Biden.

More to the point, the concerns expressed to AG Garland
1) by Senator Hagerty in a Senate Appropriations hearing on 4/26/22,
2) in the 33 Senator letter on 9/19/22,
3) by Senator Grassley in a Senate Judiciary hearing on 3/1/23, and
4) just last week before the House Judiciary Committee
were ABSOLUTELY valid: Weiss had to go through various processes that presented conflicts of interest and failed to avoid political influence on the case.

As the documents released today by Congress make abundantly clear, these conflicts have resulted in the loss to taxpayers of $125k in taxes Hunter Biden should have paid on his 2014 Burisma income, and had the IRS whistleblowers not come forward, the conflicts would also likely have resulted in the loss of another $106k Hunter Biden improperly claimed as business expenses in 2018.

Whether Weiss uses his new special counsel authority to pursue felony criminal charges against Hunter Biden in the Central District of California for lying on his 2018 taxes or misdemeanor charges for failing to file and pay in other years is yet to be seen. But the public should understand that this is the process that got us here, and should demand that Hunter Biden pay this $231k in taxes *regardless* of what prosecutors decide to do.