IRS whistleblower's attorney questions contact with Garland subordinate: 'Sounded like intel-gathering'

Posted 33 days ago

From WWW.FOXNEWS.COM

An attorney for IRS investigator-turned-whistleblower Gary Shapley spoke out Thursday following reports a Justice Department official reached out for information about his client's allegations about Hunter Biden, before abruptly becoming disinterested.

Tristan Leavitt, one of Shapley's lawyers, told "The Story" on Thursday the account of events is more nuanced than initial reports. He said Shapley was automatically shielded by whistleblower protections by matter of statute, but that he and co-counsel Mark Lytle were trying to have their client authorized to disclose sensitive taxpayer information about the subject of his complaint, Hunter Biden.

According to a report from Fox News correspondent David Spunt, Shapley was originally encouraged in April by Associate Deputy Attorney General Bradley Weinsheimer, who reportedly said he would indeed be protected as a whistleblower.

Lytle, Shapley's other attorney, told Spunt that the day following his discussion with Weinsheimer, Delaware U. S. Attorney David Weiss met with Weinsheimer and then-Hunter Biden attorney Christopher Clark in Washington.

In the time following that get-together, the promises of whistleblower protection "suddenly disappeared," the reporter said.

On "The Story," Leavitt said he sent Congress a letter around that time requesting the aforementioned taxpayer data authorization, and that Weinsheimer's contact with Lytle soon followed.

"He offered that the Justice Department wanted to hear all about the allegations," Leavitt said, adding that what happened next contradicted Garland's own public comments about Weiss' prosecutorial independence.

"We tried to take that in good faith. That sounded a little bit like an intel-gathering pursuit prior to [Shapley] testifying before Congress. But what we didn't know at the time was that Weinsheimer had already scheduled a meeting the very next day with Hunter Biden's attorneys and U. S. attorney David Weiss, which is completely contrary to what Attorney General Merrick Garland had told Congress and the American public just seven weeks earlier."

While he and Lytle corresponded with Congress, Garland again claimed Weiss had ultimate authority to prosecute Biden from his perch in Wilmington.... (Read more)












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