2023-09-19 05:01:00
The son of the US president, Hunter Biden, sued the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) for having illegally revealed the information from his tax return, which was obtained as a result of the investigation against him.
Biden filed the complaint with a District of Columbia court on Monday, alleging that several officials illegally disclosed his tax information and complaining that the agency did not protect his private records.
“Biden has no more or fewer rights than any other American citizen, and no government agency or agent is free to violate his rights simply because of who he is,” notes the complaint, which does not question the legitimacy of the IRS investigation. about Biden for the last five years, but only the dissemination of information.
This complaint comes four days after Hunter Biden was charged last Thursday with three charges related to the purchase and possession of weapons, which is illegal when it comes to a person with addictions.
According to the indictment, on or around October 12, 2018, Hunter Biden purchased a handgun, a .38-caliber Colt Cobra, and lied to the seller by giving him a certificate stating that he was not an illicit consumer. nor addicted to stimulants, narcotics or other controlled substances.
The Department of Justice indicated in a statement that, if convicted of the three charges, Hunter Biden could receive a maximum of 25 years in prison.
The indictment of the grand jury of the District of Delaware does not mention the other crime for which he was also investigated, the irregular declaration of taxes, which is related to the complaint filed this Monday by the president’s son.
Republicans, led by former President Donald Trump (2017-2021), have used the investigation against Hunter Biden to sow doubts about his businesses abroad and to describe the president’s family as corrupt.
The investigations against Hunter Biden were opened in 2018 during Trump’s term and conservatives have relied on them to attack the Democratic president, whom they accuse of not having made any effort to take this investigation to the end.
In the complaint filed today, Hunter Biden requests, among other things, all documents related to the disclosure of tax information, $1,000 for each unauthorized disclosure, and attorneys’ fees.
The lawsuit does not name the two IRS agents-turned-whistleblowers as defendants, but focuses on disclosures made by officials Gary Shapley and Joseph Ziegler and their attorneys in public statements, congressional testimony and interviews.
“Despite clear warnings from Congress that they were prohibited from disclosing the content of their testimony to the public in another forum, Shapley and Ziegler’s testimony only emboldened their media campaign against Biden,” the lawsuit states.
Since their public testimony before the House of Representatives on July 19, 2023, the lawsuit notes, the agents have become regular guests of the media and have “disclosed confidential information” about Biden’s tax return.
With Joe Biden as Democrats’ strongest bet to run in the 2024 presidential election, his son’s judicial setbacks threaten to complicate his path to re-election for the president.
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