It wasn’t all that long ago that internet sleuths were accusing Joseph Ziegler of being a Democrat activist sabotaging the Hunter Biden investigation from within. I think that’s been put to rest today.
In his testimony and an interview with CBS News’ Catherine Herridge (formerly of FOX News), Ziegler made it clear that any attempts at investigating the broader Biden family had been suppressed.
“I was the lead IRS case agent on the Hunter Biden investigation. I recently discovered that people are saying that I must be more credible because I’m a Democrat who happens to be married to a man,” Ziegler stated in his opening statement. “I’m no more credible than this man sitting next to me due to my sexual orientation or my political beliefs. The truth is my credibility comes today from my job experience with the IRS and my intimate knowledge of the agency’s standards and procedures.”
:”I am risking my career, my reputation, and my casework,” he told members of Congress. “No one should be above the law, regardless of your political affiliation.”
Ziegler revealed that, “In August of 2022, we had a phone call with all of the assigned prosecutors and they had said that all four of them were recommending the approval of felony and misdemeanor tax charges.”
Under questioning by Rep. Raskin, he demonstrated the failure to charge Hunter.
During the investigation, Ziegler said he “felt handcuffed.” For example, he says he wanted prosecutors to obtain a search warrant to access a Virginia storage unit to search for potential business records but they declined to do so. He said requests to interview Hunter Biden’s adult children about the tax payments were frustrated by prosecutors, whom he claims said the requests could “get us into hot water.”
Millions of dollars in foreign money poured into shell companies associated with the Biden family.
In another instance, Ziegler said he tried to get location data to determine whether Joe Biden was in the room, as his son had boasted in a 2017 WhatsApp message where he appeared to pressure a Chinese businessman to make good on an outstanding payment by mentioning his father.
“I am sitting here with my father..we would like to understand why the commitment made has not been fulfilled,” Hunter Biden allegedly texted to the businessman, according to the transcript. He added, “I would like to resolve this now before it gets out of hand” and “now means tonight.”
Ziegler said the WhatsApp message was found on Hunter Biden’s iCloud account that was obtained through a search warrant. He says he was unable to determine whether Hunter Biden and his father were together when the WhatsApp message was sent. President Biden has said he was never present when any such message was sent and denied any knowledge of this message.
“Anytime we potentially wanted to go down the road of asking questions related to the president, it was ‘That’s gonna take too much approvals. We can’t ask those questions.”
Zeigler said he expected extra approvals when investigating the son of a president, but he said the requests went unmet.
There would be a point to where it would be like, ‘Well, let’s think about it. Let’s put that on the back burner.’ And it would now move down to item number 50,” Ziegler said.
And that is how we ended up with Hunter’s timid slap on the wrist.