Internal Revenue Service Commissioner Daniel Werfel denied intervening to retaliate against a whistleblower in the Hunter Biden investigation, a report claims.
Werfel denied the allegations of retaliation in a May 17 letter to the House Ways and Means Committee, which was obtained by Fox News. In the letter, the commissioner said that the reassignment of the whistleblower was at the direction of the Department of Justice and was not his doing.
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“I want to state unequivocally that I have not intervened – and will not intervene – in any way that would impact the status of any whistleblower,” Werfel said.
“The IRS whistleblower you reference alleges that the change in their work assignment came at the direction of the Department of Justice. As a general matter and not in reference to any specific case, I believe it is important to emphasize that in any matter involving federal judicial proceedings, the IRS follows the direction of the Justice Department,” he continued.
Werfel claimed that he reached out to Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration J. Russel George to learn more. However, he said that laws pertaining to an ongoing investigation mean he is not able to provide additional details.
“When I first learned of the allegations of retaliation referenced in your letter and in media reports on May 16, 2023, I contacted the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA). In light of laws and policies designed to protect the integrity of pending proceedings, I am unable to provide details on this matter,” the commissioner wrote.
“TIGTA confirmed that my role as Commissioner in any whistleblower proceeding is not an investigative one. When an IRS employee raises allegations of this kind, the Commissioner’s office does not run an investigation, seek the identity of the whistleblower, or similarly intervene; instead, the Inspector General serves as a critical guardian of the whistleblower process and conducts relevant inquiries into the matter,” he added.
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The Washington Examiner reached out to the House Ways and Means Committee for comment.
The whistleblower was a career IRS criminal supervisory special agent who, according to his lawyer, could reveal “clear conflicts of interest” in the Biden investigation as well as “examples of preferential treatment and politics improperly infecting decisions and protocols that would normally be followed by career law enforcement professionals in similar circumstances if the subject were not politically connected.”
