>> there was a tweet or a message in the laptop from hunter biden to kevin, who -- it said "the bidens are the best i know at doing exactly what the chairman wants from this partnership." now, the chairman he is referring to is chairman yee of -- >> i believe so, yes. >> so, can you tell me what the bidens are best at. do you understand what he would have meant by that? this is a chinese company, and i think the ranking member referred to it -- the same entity that aided the money that he got indicted for for being an

unregistered foreign agent i believe was the charge. but this is another solicitation from hunter biden, and he refers to the bidens, plural, and they are best at doing what the chairman wants. i think that's very concerning to our committee because this is a chinese communist party owned entity. this is of concern to our national security, and i did not know, in closing, if you had any information with respect to that, there appeared >> with respect to those messages, it was something we needed to follow up on, and that was one of the major deviations, that investigators asked to follow to take some investigative steps to review vet, and it just was not supported. further delving into what that means, i simply cannot do. >> i can promise you we are not

going to stop until we understand what he fully meant by a bad message to a chinese communist party official. >> can i say something about that? thank you for that question. there was a long what that message contained in that that was only a portion of it, so what we can do or go back, turn that over to the committee. they can vote to release it, and then that information can be available. >> thank you. i now yield to ranking member askins. >> it seems that a lot of your testimony has been about the problem of prosecutorial dissension and the tug-of-war between those who want to charge as many offenses as they have come across. and prosecutors who are more attuned to the rigors of the

courtroom and forensic evidence. i admitted as a former state assistant attorney general, i see it more from the prosecutors than the investigator standpoint, but mr. shapley, would you concede that there are lots of crimes that are identified by investigators that are not actually charged by prosecutors routinely? i will give you an example. in the recent prosecution -- the recent indictment of donald trump for retaining government documents that he unlawfully took according to the indictment. he was charged only with possessing those documents that were recovered after the august 2022 search warrant, but he had hundreds of documents that were recovered before that. 15 boxes that were recovered in january and after the grand jury subpoena, but the prosecutors decided not to charge any of those offenses. they said that they would take

the most egregious offensive and charge of those. is that unfamiliar to you, that kind of decision by a pros prosecutor? >> i can't speak to anything related to the trump investigation, but it was not just investigators. exhibit 2 in my testimony clearly shows the prosecution recommendation report where it says right in the document that the united states attorney and tax division agree with those recommended charges. and then again, special agent ziegler alluded to in late 2022 -- >> recommended to whom? >> the department of justice. referred to the tax division for approval, discretion -- >> right, but then it all went to the u.s. attorney in del delaware. >> that's not entirely accurate because the tax division up through march 16th of 2023 had

not yet approved, provided discretion, or decline charges. so u.s. attorney weiss had no authority to charge any of those charges without the tax division's approval beforehand. >> and i would like to say something about this real quick. >> let me get back to you. i only have a limited amount of time. mr. ziegler, you say that hunter biden's unpaid taxes were around $2 million, and he is now made those back taxes, and he is been criminally charged for not paying taxes. will you just explain how people can be charged for not paying taxes even after they've made amends and gone forward to pay them? >> under the statute, when someone fails to timely pay their taxes, usually due april 15th, once that date occurs, they have a known tax liability and have failed to pay

it, the crime has already been committed. the fact that they paid after is a mitigating factor that the judge can use to their discretion at sentencing. this does not include the over $100,000, that was not charged. >> you made yourself clear. you thought that there were additional charges that were laid on the table and not pursued by david weiss, the trump appointee. but the a critical moment to blow the whistle was the octobet you had with david weiss. up to that point, you say you are willing to talk of the differences with prosecutors to the typical "investigator versus prosecutor type thing," which i think this is all about, but you say "if i was not in the meeting, my redline might not have been crossed, and i think you reaffirmed that today.

what crossed your redline is that in that meeting, you understood mr. weiss tv saying he did not have the authority to bring charges without the approval of the u.s. attorneys for those districts. is that right? >> that is correct. >> but in a letter that he sent in june, he stated "i've been granted ultimate authority over this matter, including responsibility for deciding where, when, and whether to file charges." he went on to explain that considering charges and districts outside delaware, usual practice would be "to contact the district attorney's office and determine whether it wants to partner on the case. if they decline, he would be granted authority to bring the charges himself under "special attorney status from the attorney general pursuant to 28, section 515. to try to clear this up, let's go back to march 2022, when you

explain that the u.s. attorney for d.c. declined to partner with mr. weiss to bring the 2014 and 2015 charges. after the decision by the u.s. attorney, mr. weiss continue to discuss those charges with all of you. in fact, mr. ziegler, you describe how you had a meeting in which u.s. attorney weiss expressed some concerns about those charges, including that hunter biden was in the throes of his drug addiction after the death of his brother. and mr. weiss tells you, and i quote "i'm still weighing it." mr. weiss was telling you that he was the one weighing whether to bring the 2014 and 2015 charges. isn't that correct? >> that is correct. >> coming back to you this meeting, according to you, he said that he decided not to

charge 2014 and 2015. it seems to me that this meeting which he described as a redline is just a misunderstanding, that after he declined to partner on the ' 14 '15 charges, he took a good luck an end ultimately decided not to charge them and therefore not to seek the special attorney status. he may have been right or wrong about that as you guys make your case, but it was his decision. isn't that right, mr. shapley? >> that is not supported by the facts. his own admission that i documented contemporaneously. the only piece of -- >> he contradicts with what you are saying. he does not agree with what you are saying. now i was not at that meeting, but what was said may be a little ambiguous or unclear today. his letter to chairman jordan could not be more clear.

he had "ultimate authority, including responsibility for deciding where, when, and whether to file the charges." so if there's any end security, it has got to go to david weiss, the donald trump handpicked attorney. >> can i say something real quick? i have two things i wanted to bring up. there are a lot of different tax cases out there that include misdemeanors and felonies. lots of different reasons why we charge of a felony. but i want to be clear on this, that when you have a felony charge with a misdemeanor that you have to charge the felony. in this case, they did not charge that felony. one more point to this. we had a meeting with -- >> you have to charge that felony. that is a department of justice rule? >> that is in the manual, that you have to charge the felony. >> you are saying whether or not the evidence supports it?

>> that is in that analysis -- that goes back to the point of the certain deductions that were taken. the certain deductions that were taken on the tax return. that is for you guys you guys to decide whether the felony was there or not. >> that is for the u.s. attorney to decide. i am afraid we are not going to be able to investigate every tax case in america. >> now recognizing mr. smith from missouri. >> thank you, mr. shapley, mr. ziegler. i want to thank you both for your testimony and your willingness to come forward and tell the truth for the american public. i apologize of the behavior of some of our colleagues and how the press has treated you for doing what is right so the american people can see it. mr. shapley, included in the document provided to the ways and means committee is a document labeled exhibit 2.

which is a portion of the special agent report. this document is located following page 41 of the transcript, this one. what is this document, and what recommendations are made in this document? >> this is the prosecution recommendation report that the irs agents produce out the end of an investigation when they are going to recommend prosecution to the department of justice. this was authored by special agent ziegler. several thousand pages. the facts and the elements in this particular report, the elements of each violation show which piece of evidence meets bad elements, so in this report, it recommended felony charges for 2014, 2018, 2019. misdemeanor charges for 2015, 2016, 2019. further shows that special agent

ziegler spoke with prosecutors and worked hand-in-hand and they clearly agreed that the elements of these violations were met, and they supported this document. and when that was sent to the tax division for approval in 2022. >> mr. shapley, what level of confidence does the irs need to have to recommend charges like the felony counts listed in this document? >> each violation has each element listed in the report, and the evidence is shown. this report goes through internal departments. and in addition to the prosecutor is agreeing that the evidence supported charging felony counts of senior leadership of the director of field operations, also personally reviewed this and approved it to be sent to the department of justice tax

division. >> were you surprised that prosecutors announced a plea agreement with hunter biden under which he would only plead guilty to violations of two misdemeanor charges? >> cell, you know, the guilty plea is outside of my control, but what i can say is it is not what an investigator thought. it is not what special agent ziegler and i thought what felony charges were proven in this case. they again and again agreed with that assessment. united states attorney weiss also agreed with these because he went to the d.c. u.s. attorney to ask him to partner. you don't do that if you don't yourself agree with those charges. when he got denied that he requested social authority and was declined as he said in the meeting. >> yeah, in the report that we

just highlighted, it states in there that even leslie wolf agreed with these charges moving forward. mr. ziegler, on page 32 of the transcript of your testimony, you discuss the need to interview hunter biden's adult children regarding certain deductions that you listed earlier hunter biden, included on his tax returns. you also testified that assistant united states attorney leslie wolf told you that you would get into a hot water is interviewed the president's grandchildren. in other cases that you've worked over your career, have you ever had a prosecutor tell you that you could not interview a relevant witness? >> so there are certain things that come into whether we talk to a witness or not. if they are an attorney, if there is some special situation

that might, but i have never been slow that we could not approach someone to interview them as a part of an investigation. yeah, there are certain situations where you have to do a further analysis of the information you might get, like i said, if there an attorney. in this case we needed to talk to witnesses related to things that were deducted on the tax return. and in this case, it was the adult children that we needed to talk to. >> thank you. my time has expired. >> the gentleman from illinois. >> thank you for your service to this country. really appreciate you coming and appearing in this capacity. first of all, mr. ziegler, i see at page 12 of your transcript that you start laying out a series of concerns that you had with regard to various people,

and different issues related to this investigation. you say "i started this investigation in november 2018 after reviewing bank deposits." then you say career irs staff were not initially supportive of starting the investigation. of course in november 2018, joe biden was not the president, correct? >> joe biden was not the president you're correct. >> you had a concern about attorney general bill barr consolidating the series of cases into the u.s. attorney's office in delaware. at that point you say "what was the potential issue i saw with working the case in delaware? we were working with a small attorney's office who might not have ever worked a case of this caliber." now of course bill barr was appointed by donald trump, correct? >> yes, that is correct. >> let me turn to another

concern you lay out in your testimony. you are concerned about the quality of the prosecutors. on page 14, you say "the prosecutors were the jv squad, and they were not up to the task of handling such a big case." now sir, u.s. attorney weiss was also appointed by donald trump, right? >> so, as far as the actual nomination and what went into why -- >> i'm not asking you why. i am saying he was appointed by donald trump, correct? >> that is correct. >> another concern that you lay out, you talk about your concerns about this investigation having been made overt. being publicized for the world to know. you say "one of the first disagreements i recall between the irs investigators and prosecutors was the idea of

going public. now, sir, this is in -- joe biden was not the president then, was he? >> i don't recall the exact date of when he said he was going to run -- >> that is not my question, sir. joe biden was not the president at that time, correct? let me turn to you for a second year, mr. shapley. you also raised concerns. one is this. you said you are concerned about the complexities of the election cycle and potential delays that arose in connection with the election cycle. you said on page 23 "and i remember there were always times where we were always on an impending election cycle. it was always the elections being brought up in early 2020. it was the presidential primaries. joe biden was not the president at that time either, was he?

>> the answer to your question is no, he was not, but i don't see where you reference to that in my -- >> page 23. you're talking about how the election cycle is delaying decisions by the prosecution, and it turns out that the delay in the election cycle was happening at a time when joe biden was not the president. >> i'm sorry, sir, that is in special agent ziegler's transcript. that is why i could not find it. >> you shared concerns about delays related to the election cycle, but at that time, joe biden was not the president. >> i believe at that time he was the nominee for president. >> well, he was not the president, was he? it's just a simple question, s sir. joe biden was not the presidents in the presidential primaries in 2020. >> correct. that is correct.

>> finally, mr. shapley, you said that warrants were ready as soon as april 2022 begin searching for records, but actions were not taken with regard to those warrants. again, joe biden was not the president in april 2020, was he? >> i'm confused by your line of questioning, talking about an election in which he was now a part of. he did not have to be the president to have election meddling. >> but the question is this. was he the president at that time? >> it has been asked and answered. >> the answer is... yes or no? >> no. gmac thank you. >> mr. chairman, and i finish? >> you may answer the question. >> an election is for the purpose of electing a president, and joe biden at that time was a

nominee for president of the united states. therefore the election clauses with the doj policy took place and were in effect. it was not until september 4th that the department of justice public integrity said that we can no longer take any actions on that case, and as early as -- -- as early as april to june of 2020, the department of justice and the delaware attorney's office was invoking the election as a reason not to perform those search warrants. >> time has expired. the chair now recognizes the gentleman from ohio. >> he said i've been granted ultimate authority, including responsibility for deciding where, when, whether to file charges. later that same month, the second letter where he said no, i don't. now, i don't have that charging authority. so he says i'm the boss, i can

do what i want, and june 30th, he says now, i can't. what happened between those two events? your testimony goes public. he says i have to change my story because now the truth is coming out, and it sounds like in this investigation, to me, that the prosecutors and the investigators were in agreement, and then we get to october 2022. i see mr. zigler nodding his head. that meeting is when he told you something. what did he say? >> he told me he was not the deciding person. told us that the d.c. u.s. attorney had declined to press charges. and denied that. >> and was denied. were you the only guy at that meeting? how many other people were there? >> seven total people. >> you, mr. weiss, five others.

did any of them come forward and say what you just said is not true? no one has, right? no one has disputed or refuted or said that it is not true? did you memorialize what took place in that meeting? >> yes, i did. i put it in an email to the two senior executives. >> bad day. i got the email, exhibit ten in your testimony when you were interviewed by about ways and means committee. friday evening, 6:09:00 p.m. who are those individuals? >> director of field operations for the southern division, and darrell weldon was the special agent involved. >> these are your bosses, correct? did he get back to you? do you remember what he said? >> he said thanks, gary, you

covered it all. >> he affirmed what you said. you laid it out. just what you told me a few minutes ago. what mr. weiss told you in that meeting, and when that goes public, mr. weiss says i have got to change my story. i better send a letter to judiciary committee where he says i stand by what i wrote, but i wish to expand. i wish to fix it. then he had to go further in july when he talked to you -- when he sent a letter to senator graham and said to clarify again, they have changed their story. you guys haven't. mr. weiss was consistent with the investigators up until this meeting, and then he changed. what do you think happened? >> i don't know what happened internally at the department of justice, but what i can say is

that the story has been changing from the department of justice and the only person who has any documents that have been corroborated are my own. >> exactly. anyone with common sense can see what happened. he said i had discussions with justice. i had discussions with -- whatever it was, i don't know, but he had discussions with people, and suddenly things changed. that all became evident on october 7th. the investigators and the prosecutors, they were in agreement. here is how we do it. here's how we've always done it. we've got the two best agents in the place on the case, and then something changes, and i think it's what mr. weiss conveyed when he said i had discussions with folks at main justice. it looks pretty obvious, what happened.

looks pretty obvious. initially everyone was pounding their chest. david weiss has complete authority. now suddenly he doesn't because you guys came forward and told the truth. i yelled back. >> the chair now recognizes mr. lynch from massachusetts. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i want to thank the witnesses for helping us out. i am surprised, though, that there seems to be a new level of hypocrisy here. as a long-standing member of this committee, i think most of the members who have served a long time you know full well what political interference and what sweetheart deals look like. and i think context is very important. in 2017, we had a situation where a former national security advisor and trump campaign

sergei, michael flynn, was indicted. indicted by a federal jury, federal grand jury. he pled guilty twice. and he lied to fbi agents about his communications with the russian government prior to the inauguration of president trump. he was only national security advisor for 22 days. but my colleagues on the other side of the aisle had no interest, zero interest in looking into that case. and in response, the president at the time, president trump repeatedly and publicly attacked to the case and of the agents who brought it, including by claiming that mr. flynn was the victim of "dirty filthy cops at the top of the fbi." he also described the prosecution as a disgrace and claimed that those who investigated mr. flynn were guilty of treason.

those are public statements made by a sitting president attacking the fbi. and despite the fact that mr. flynn pleaded guilty twice to lying to the fbi, president trump's attorney general, william barr, personally intervened in the case, and that led the department of justice to abruptly reverse course and have the case dismissed on grounds that a federal judge found dubious to say the least. that is a quote from the judge. in the case of longtime trump associates roger stone, a federal jury found him not guilty in 2019 of obstructing an investigation into russian interference in the presidential election by lying to congress and witness tampering. in response, a sitting president, president trump immediately took to twitter, attacking the department of justice and accusing them of employing a "double standard"

and committing a "miscarriage of justice. president trump also publicly attacked the department's sentencing recommendation leading senior officials to overrule the federal prosecutors who had investigated and brought the case. this blatant political intervention, not complained of it all by my republican colleagues at the time, cost of those prosecutors, some of them, to resign or withdraw from the case. president trump even congratulated him for interfering. that's what political intervention looks like, and we know it on this committee. in case of paul manafort, who worked to elect a pro-kremlin president in ukraine, and was convicted in 2018 of bank and tax fraud, ultimately pleading guilty to conspiracy against the

united states and conspiracy to obstruct justice. president trump deemed it "a very sad day for our country." and in terms of sweetheart de deals, at the end of his term, president trump branded dell not granted full pardons to his allies, and his pals. allowing them to escape accountability for their numerous crimes. now that is a sweetheart deal. they got away with everything. not like hunter biden, who is pleading guilty, suffers the reputational damage and embarrassment to his family. at the widely publicized facts of his drug addiction. and this was a trump-appointed u.s. attorney.

that prosecuted this for four years. and president biden did not seek to remove them, which normally happens when a new president comes in the office. he has the full right to remove them. never did so. mr. chairman, i yelled back. >> we now recognize mr. timmons from south carolina. >> thank you. i am going to try to help simplify this for the american people. we are here because a our institutions are broken. we have transformed into a political weapon of the left, a process that i believe began during the obama administration. based on their ideological beliefs specifically targeting donald trump to pose a significant threat. upon his election, the bureaucratic resistance did not stop. their hatred for trump permeated throughout their work,

attempting to cripple the administration at every turn, and the doj and the irs i were to not only protect the criminal actions of the biden family but to continue persecuting president trump. some describe this as a two-tiered system, but it is deliberately and systema systematically -- due to their hatred for president trump. they cover up the crimes of the current president and members of his family all will issuing perfectly planned indictments against president trump. today we are joined by two whistle-blowers from the irs. also whistle-blowers -- these people that are stepping forward now because after the election, the american people have trusted the house majority to republicans, granting us the peanut power. we now possess crucial evidence just months into our investigations. the american people can see plain as day the room and all actions. we are here to do the jobs that

they refuse to do. they have failed to fulfill their duties and properly investigate these bribery schemes which have resulted in million-dollar payouts. i cannot imagine how difficult this has been on you and your family. i think the best use of my time is to help simplify the complex scheme for the american people, help do the job that they just refuse to do. we talk about china, romania, ukraine. it all seems complicated, but this scheme was born and then replicated in other countries. ukraine is the proof of concept, if you will. foreign client has a problem. vice president biden travels to the country. he leverages u.s. influence to force a favorable income for the client. the biden family earns their f fee. that's the scheme. that's the scheme.

so, let's just start with ukraine. i'm going to walk you through the timeline. burisma has a problem. they want to get their stock listed on wall street. but they cannot get the outcome they want in new york, so they hire hunter biden, paying him millions of dollars. if i can direct you to page 99, is it accurate to say hunter biden received millions of dollars from burisma? >> yes, that would be accurate. >> i want to point out that he has zero qualifications in this industry, but he does have the big guy. an email to hunter, executives say that he's demanding a higher level u.s. officials visited, and this is obtained from hunter biden's laptop. he confirms the big guy is on the way.

have no fear. biden has an official visit, threatens the president to -- he lied about this during the campaign. specifically said it was not true. sure enough, they conspired. if you have any questions about whether he fired him, he brags about eight years later. ladies and gentlemen, the american people, that is the scheme. that is the proof of concept. they replicated it again and again because they never dreamed he'd be president. he is vulnerable. he is vulnerable. and our national security is vulnerable because of it. we are not here to prosecute hunter biden. we care about our country is

national security decisions and whether our country is compromised. that is why we are here. with that, mr. chairman, i yield back. >> senator conley from virginia. >> thank you. thank you both for being here today. my friend from south carolina set he was going to simplify this for the american people. i think he succeeded. so simple as to be unrecognizable, and if you are going to talk about ukraine and burisma, let's remember that it is not -- donald j. trump was impeached over a phone call to the president of ukraine. wanting to get dirt on this very subject. on this very individual with this very company. and it was withheld military equipment desperately needed as we now know, including missiles, which are very useful in

antitank warfare. he was impeached, quite correctly, but my friends on the other side of the aisle all voted against that. they had no problem with that kind of interference that directly affected national security. mr. shapley and mr. ziegler, you both testified about the fact that you've been subject to criticism, ridicule, public disclosure, perhaps menacing comments, because you come forward. is that correct? >> menacing comments? yes, sir. >> and you too, mr. ziegler. that must be a terrible feeling. and whoever does not, i think you would probably both agree, is doing it in service to you individually. you are simply doing your duty

as you see the light. fair enough? >> yes. >> mr. ziegler. >> i am doing my duty. >> can you imagine how the district attorney in fulton county, georgia, must feel are the district attorney in manhattan must feel or the special counsel of the department of justice, mr. smith, must feel, when the very subject of an indictment or pending indictment takes to public rally and ridicules them by name, disparages them by name, characterizes them by name, putting them and their families at the same risk you're experiencing. it is said it's wrong for these anonymous people to criticize you, it must certainly be wrong that the former president of the united states would demonize people doing their jobs just like you tried to do yours.

you can disagree with their judgment. but it's not right to disparage their character. and what is so ironic about this hearing is, again, not one mention on the other side of the aisle about that maligned behavior by the very subject of the indictment. speaking of interference, the american people now president trump pressured the justice department, which we are talking about here today, like wouldn't that be wrong, if someone did that, to go easy on his friend, michael flynn? we know when president trump's handpicked attorney general, william barr, took the reins, he pressured officials to reduce the sentencing for roger stone and glossed over robert robert mueller's 2016 presidential election report, saying he exonerated the president, when he explicitly said no, it did not, and listed

ten specific items of obstruction of justice he recommended be pursued and pointed out, lest we misunderstand that part, he could not inundate a sitting president according to doj guidelines, but he said in his report, an enterprising district attorney might want to pursue it. according to recent reporting in "the new york times," president trump explicitly told chief of staff john kelly that they "ought to investigate and get the irs on form or civil servants that mr. trump considered his political enemies." explicit testimony from his own chief of staff, but again, absolute silence on the other side of the aisle, including from the ways and means committee, which purports to be so concerned about any hint of interference by any political entity or individual over the

pristine work of the department of justice and the irs. an agency, i might add, another piece of irony in this area, that has been disparaged as the boot on the neck of the american taxpayer for so long by the majority and denied resources by the majority. as we speak, they've cut $24 billion in the debt ceiling compromise agreement out of the $80 billion we provided to in fact give you more resources to do your job. i yield back. >> we are going to have two more questions, and at the request of the witnesses, and every 90 minute mark, we are going to take a ten minute bathroom recess, so we will recognize the next two question is and then go to that recess. we recognize representative

turner. >> inc. you for being here. i appreciate your courage and your dedication to the truth and your sense of obligation. surprisingly, my questions are going to be about your testimony. we are going to have a little shifted to actually talk about what you are here for. i am going to cite specific spots of your transcript testimony, but i don't think you will have to read along. if i ask a question after having cited one and you want to refer to it, please let me know, but i think pretty much we will be able to follow along. mr. ziegler, you stated on page 17 that you started this investigation in november 2018 after reviewing bank reports related to another case that you were working on. those bank reports identify hunter biden as paying prostitutes. also evidence that he was living

lavishly through his corporate bank account. mr. ziegler, did you actually review these bank knowledge, not knowledge that someone is relating to you, you actually looked at these documents. >> that is correct. i looked at them. >> mr. shapley, hunter biden, when he did, that he told burisma to send that infor information, and when the money came back to him, he booked it as a loan. should have been taxable as soon as it became income, and whatever he did with that after that was just a scheme to evade taxes that year. did not book this as a loan itself, so treating it differently than they did. is this actually you are viewing

of them to create this money? >> yes, i saw that evidence. >> you also looked at these bank records. >> yes. >> you went on to say this is like t textbook. you've got to have a promissory note. to find interest. none of them were included. so, hunter biden claims this is a loan, but the company he got it from does not claim that. there is now promissory note, no repayments. >> they actually booked it as a deduction. >> the meaning that it would have been a payment to him, so it would have been income to him, then payable with tax. excellent. it was not just the bank documents that you looked at. you also have the opportunity to

look at a memo, and that was hunter biden's accountants. in your testimony, you included exhibit 4, a memo from the accountant, saying you are going to owe tax on this, so you've got the accountants agreeing that this is income and that there should have been income tax paid on it. >> the correction to you that is that i did not provide the document. >> okay, excellent. we have his accountants agr agreeing. so, both of you, i think, indicate that the taxable amount of the $400,000, that hunter biden would have had to pay. is that correct? >> that's correct. >> and you had no evidence in all the records that those taxes were ever paid.

>> now, they were not. >> they were not paid by hunter biden. >> the statute of limitations was allowed to run. you go on to state that in order for him to pay this, that the government does not have a way to compel him to pay it. he got out of having to pay the tax, right? >> that's correct. >> so he has in his pocket $125,000 that should have gone to the government as federal taxes. about $62,000 per household. that's two for households that he got to pay. he could pay that today, right? voluntarily. >> if he chose to voluntarily, yes, he could. >> perhaps mr. president who is supposed to be in charge of taxes coming into our nation and

so often tells us the american people are not paying enough, he may want to turn to his son and say why don't you pay your ta taxes? he ought to cut the check. thank you, mr. chairman. >> we recognize ms. norton. >> mysterious shapley and mr. ziegler, thank you for being here today. we are obviously going to talk a lot in this hearing about the investigation into hunter bi biden's taxes. so i think it's important that we set the scene and make it clear what type of investigation we are talking about. mr. ziegler, what year did you open the hunter biden investigation? >> that was 2018. november 2018. >> the department of justice

announced a plea agreement with hunter biden last month. so i estimate that you spend four or five years on this investigation, mr. ziegler? >> that would be correct. >> mr. ziegler, in your testimony before the ways and means committee, you said that when you're time working on the investigation ended, it was -- and i am quoting, 99.9% done. and that you had -- here i am quoting again, "worked to complete 95% of the investigation." given this testimony, is it fair to say, mr. ziegler, that in the years that you've spent on the investigation, you saw it nearly to completion.

>> that reference was to the tax case. the tax investigation as far as all of the work that we had done regarding that. 99% of that had been done to that date. >> exactly. mr. shapley, on page 12 of your transcript, of the transcript from your interview with the ways and means committee, you describe the irs team that worked on this investigation as consisting of -- i'm quoting, 12 elite agents who were selected based on their experience and performance in the area of complex high dollar international tax invest investigations." ". mr. shapley, how serious are the investigations taken by these elite agents? >> i'm not sure i understand how

to answer your question. how serious? >> yes. they have to be very serious to be undertaken by such elite agents. >> i think i can answer this. we have to treat each taxpayer the same. that's the most important. we are kind of the agents that come in there, and we have the expertise to work these complex financial investigations, so whether there are more serious -- we have to treat each taxpayer the same, and that's what i try to do. >> i was referring to these particularly complex, high dollar -- i understand you have to give equal treatment. mr. zigler, you called the hunter biden investigations a "complex criminal tax investigation." and i understand that it was an

interagency effort involving the irs, fbi, and doj tax division in d.c. mr. ziegler, is it fair to say about this sort of interagency team is only assembled for serious and complex investigations? >> i can only speak to what happened in this particular investigation. the reason why other agencies might join an investigation, that just depends on the crimes were investigating. also at the irs, we are the only agency in the federal government that is allowed to investigate tax crimes, south that's why you have to have the irs on that case. >> yeah, and you have lots of other agencies as well. it sounds like his taxes were subject to a great deal of scrutiny and a rigorous review by a large group of

investigators who had experience working complex cases. this investigation occurred over several years, spanned the multiple agencies and divisions and had an expert team. the time, personnel, and all the resources devoted to this investigation make it abundantly clear that this investigation was taken seriously by both the irs and doj while our witnesses here today may disagree with the u.s. attorneys decision, it is undeniable that hunter biden was subject to a thorough and rigorous investigation. i thank you, and i yielded to the ranking member. >> the lady yields back. as promised to witnesses, we are going to take a ten minute recess that which we will reconvene in approximately 10 minutes. >> john: all right, fascinating hour and 15 minutes of testimony, the main message here is that the whistle-blower

and whistle-blower x, identified as joe ziegler, that he got special treatment, and continued contradictions from the u.s. attorney in the state of delaware, david weiss. >> sandra: whistle-blower ziegler explaining why he decided to come forward after multiple attempts at blowing the whistle internally at the irs. his identity finally revealed, and we will likely see this continue in about 10 minutes. we will take a quick break. shannon bream and jonathan turley still joining us now. >> it is interesting, what you are hearing from the democrats, what we thought they would say, investigators and prosecutors often have disagreements. the prison investigating is going to go forward and say this is what i think needs to be done, but they will often bob has with the prosecutor who says i am going to bring this before a jury, whatever the context is.

we have got documentation that there were some attorneys and superiors and other people who agreed with what we have come to conclude as investigators, so at some point, we are baffled by how this came together. you heard ziegler say i cannot explain how this came together based on what we discussed and what i thought was an agreement. yes they are going to butt heads over how to move forward, but he seems to say that he thought there was more agreement about what they were going to pursue. >> john: jonathan, you and i noticed exactly the same thing which i thought was curious. that is when jamie raskin -- he almost threw it away as a bit of an aside. tried to blow this whole thing out of the water that by saying what he believes this is all about is a disagreement between investigators and prosecutors. you tweeted out about this idea, jamie raskin tries to school these two whistle-blowers on

prosecutorial discretion. i mean, obviously we know what he is trying to do here, but does he have a point? >> well, i was stunned when raskin said what you are about to hear is perfectly normal. and he was sitting in front of two witnesses who are incredibly credible and forthcoming. and they are saying that this was anything but normal. they had never encountered anything like this before. they were waved off witnesses. they had targets tipped off before searches occurred. they had an agreement with prosecutors on multiple fel felonies. they describe how there was knowing a decision to allow crimes in 2014, 2152 expired because of the statute of limitations. what was amazing what shapley said there was an agreement on the table to extend that deadline, but weiss and the

department of justice just decided to let it expire. he said to this day, i don't understand why you would do t that, and i share his confusion. why would you ever allow those crimes to expire? so it was anything but normal. god help us if this is the normal process of an investigation and prosecution. >> sandra: chad pergram is also there. there was also a moment right off the top where there were some protesters in the room. i know you wanted to clarify what exactly that was all about. >> it had nothing to do with this hearing in fact, sandra. the old expression that if a tree falls in the woods, is anybody around to hear it? they were outside the hearing room. i was outside the hearing room, so these demonstrators were protesting against climate change, chanting "end fossil fuels now." brought in about 20 or 30

u.s. capitol police officers. they just wanted to be where the cameras were, made sure they got there message out. several arrests there. and ever since then, it's been quiet, so that had nothing directly to do with the hearing. it was just coinciding with the start so that they could get their message out, and guess what? here we are talking about it. they were not actually protesting what happened in the hearing room. >> john: i thought it was interesting, the lengths to which joe ziegler went to to describe who he is. he says i am a gay democrat married to a man. i hope i am an example to other lgbtq people out there, questioning doing the right thing at a potential cost to themselves and others." he's already been heavily criticized. why do you think he went into that level of detail? just say look, despite my

background, i think this is the right thing to do, to come out and talk about the president's son. >> he talked about it, i feel like it is my thing to speak up about this, but it obviously disarms the left when he comes forward with that resume and background to say i'm not somebody who has voted republican my whole life and have a partisan gripe against the biden family. so i think that there was -- because we have not known much about this whistle-blower until today, there was a little bit of taking it in and people realizing this is who this witness is. this is the viewpoint that he comes from, and even though he is getting criticism from the people he agrees with and who agree with him, he thought it was important enough to come forward and speak up. so as i witness, i think it makes him very powerful. >> sandra: thank you for joining us. appreciate that.

>> john: well, this has been an amazing hearing so far. and i think particularly when you look at the plea agreement for hunter biden coming up, i don't know if it's going to change things. but certainly brings a different perspective to the american public about what is going to happen. >> sandra: it will likely continue for hours, so we will continue to see what happens. i'm sandra smith. thanks for joining us. >> john: >> thank you. i'm trace gallagher in for martha maccallum who is on assignment. on "the story," the irs whistle-blower testimony is about to get underway. so far they have alleged that the doj played politics in hunter biden but stonewalled investigative steps that may have led to the president himself. let's bring in jason