The IRS really must have wanted to investigate Matt Taibbi, the Twitter Files journalist.
Records produced to Congress show that the tax agency opened an examination of Mr. Taibbi’s 2018 return last Christmas Eve, according to House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan.
The records also show that Mr. Taibbi was able to resolve the tax issue quickly, did not owe the IRS anything and in fact was due a “substantial refund,” Mr. Jordan said Wednesday in a new letter demanding answers from the IRS.
The IRS opened its probe of Mr. Taibbi just three weeks after he published his first Twitter Files account of government officials colluding with Twitter to shut down voices of dissent. Mr. Taibbi, who is far from a conservative journalist, quickly became a hero to the right and deepened a growing rift with those on the political left.
The IRS investigation struck a chord, with the Treasury Department struggling to explain why it sent an agent to make a house call at his home this year on the exact date that he was appearing before Congress to testify on his Twitter Files work.
Mr. Jordan said the IRS has failed to produce key records, but what it has revealed to the committee, with Mr. Taibbi’s assent, is disturbing. Mr. Jordan said an IRS agent assigned to the case did extensive research before the home visit, including looking at his voter registration records, whether he had a concealed weapons permit and whether he had a hunting or fishing license.
“It has been 10 years, to the month, since Lois Lerner disclosed the IRS’ infamous targeting of conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status,” Mr. Jordan wrote in a letter to the IRS Wednesday. “The circumstances of the IRS’ visit to Mr. Taibbi’s home as he was testifying to Congress about government abuse and censorship raise troubling questions that demand additional information.”
The Washington Times has reached out to the IRS for this story.
Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, testifying to Congress in March, said the visit did sound unusual, adding that such visits would occur only in instances of “lawbreaking.”
“It’s certainly something that I would want to look into,” she said at the time.
Mr. Jordan said in his new letter that far from lawbreaking, it appeared the IRS owed Mr. Taibbi.
“The IRS’ production confirmed one crucial fact — that Mr. Taibbi did not owe the IRS anything,” Mr. Jordan wrote. “Rather, the IRS owed Mr. Taibbi a substantial refund.”
The Ohio Republican said Mr. Taibbi was able to get the matter cleared up on March 21, or less than two weeks after the house call.
According to the records produced to Congress, the IRS said it first inquired about Mr. Taibbi’s 2018 return on Oct. 24, 2019. It flagged the return because it met the criteria for possible identity theft.
Mr. Taibbi and his lawyer said they have no record of that letter, nor a 2020 letter.
The IRS did not produce either of the letters to Congress.
The next time the IRS acted was the Christmas Eve decision to open an examination.
Mr. Jordan said the documents provided don’t explain why the IRS decided to renew the matter two years after its last inquiry, nor did the IRS explain the “unusual date” it chose to open the examination.
Mr. Taibbi said Christmas Eve was the day he published the ninth account in his Twitter Files reports.
He said the new details “should frighten any journalist — any American citizen, for that matter.”
“When the IRS checks to see if you have a carry permit and visits your home, at a time when they owe you money, it’s time to worry,” he wrote in a new report on Racket News.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.