FBI official can’t recall, refuses to answer questions over Hunter Biden whistleblower cover-up claims

WASHINGTON — A top FBI agent involved in the Hunter Biden investigation couldn’t recall or refused to answer several questions related to IRS whistleblower claims that the probe into the first son was impeded by the Justice Department.

A transcript of FBI Special Agent Thomas Sobocinski’s closed-door testimony before the House Judiciary Committee last week, reviewed by The Post, reveals that the Justice Department detailed what Sobocinski could and couldn’t talk about with lawmakers a day before his Sept. 7 interview.

“Specifically, the Department has authorized [Sobocinski] to discuss U.S. Attorney [David] Weiss’ authority, as well as the October 7th, 2022, meeting, subject to some constraints around the ongoing investigation issue,” Sara Zdeb, a deputy assistant attorney general, informed congressional investigators before questioning began, referencing a letter to Sobocinski signed by Associate Deputy Attorney General Bradley Weinsheimer. 

IRS whistleblower Gary Shapley, who supervised the Hunter Biden tax fraud investigation for more than three years, claimed in bombshell congressional testimony earlier this year that during the Oct. 7, 2022, meeting between senior-level managers from the IRS, the FBI and the Delaware US Attorney’s Office, Weiss declared that he was not the “deciding official on whether charges are filed” against Hunter and revealed that US Attorney Matthew Graves would not allow him to charge Hunter for tax fraud in DC and said he asked for and was denied special counsel authority from the DOJ. 

Shapley took and distributed contemporaneous notes of the meeting, with his boss, DC IRS Special Agent in Charge Darrell Waldon, allegedly emailing in response that he had “covered it all.”

Weiss’ alleged remarks at the Oct. 7 meeting spurred perjury allegations against Attorney General Merrick Garland, who testified twice under oath to Congress that Weiss was able to bring charges against Hunter Biden outside of Delaware and that “if he needs to bring it in another jurisdiction, he will have full authority to do that.”

Garland in August elevated Weiss to the rank of special counsel after the collapse of a probation-only plea deal for Hunter Biden in Delaware.

The new status allows him to bring charges in other jurisdictions — but only after Graves’ refusal to prosecute allegedly allowed Hunter Biden off the hook for tax evasion in 2014 and 2015 due to a statute of limitations.

Sobocinski confirmed his attendance at the Oct. 7 meeting but did not recall Weiss downplaying his authority. 

“I don’t,” Sobocinski responded when asked if he remembered Weiss stating during the meeting that he was not the deciding person on whether charges would be filed.

“I do not remember — I don’t — he didn’t say that,” the agent later said when asked again about the bombshell claim. “In my recollection, if he would have said that, I would have remembered it.”

House Republicans compelled Sobocinski’s testimony last month after Shapley identified him as a potential corroborating witness.

Other participants at the meeting were issued subpoenas to describe their recollections of the Oct. 7 meeting including Waldon, IRS Director of Field Operations Michael Batdorf, and Baltimore Assistant Special Agent in Charge Ryeshia Holley.

Sobocinski, who was assigned to the Hunter Biden investigation in July 2021, stated that he was “not aware” of discussions between Weiss and Graves related to the first son’s 2014 and 2015 tax returns and that he was under the impression that Weiss had the “authority in the US to bring the charges where venue presented itself.”

“I’m not personally aware of that, of what actually happened,”  Sobocinski said when asked about Graves’ alleged refusal to charge Hunter Biden in DC. 

The agent explained that “taxes were not a discussion that Dave and I regularly had. It was whatever the full case resolution would look like. And so, yeah, the tax years was not something that David and I regularly talked about.” 

“I have no general knowledge of what the IRS charges are as far as when they lapse or when they don’t lapse,” Sobocinski said, later explaining that he only had “a very high-level sense of IRS charges” and not “the minutia of their ability to charge.”

The special agent in charge of the FBI’s Baltimore Field Office did recall: “There was, like, a bureaucratic administrative process [Weiss] had to work through, but I never viewed it as or talked about it as approval. I don’t remember David saying approval. It was solely a process that he had to work through.”

“I don’t know the intricacies of that, but it definitely seemed very cumbersome,” Sobocinski said of his knowledge of the hoops he believes Weiss needed to jump through in order to seek tax charges against Hunter Biden in DC. 

When asked if the DOJ’s tax division tried to convince Weiss during a June 15, 2022, meeting to not bring the 2014 or 2015 tax fraud charges against Hunter Biden, Sobocinski responded, “I couldn’t comment on that.”

Shapley claims that Sobocinski slammed the issues raised by DOJ tax division lawyers as “nonsense” during breaks in the meeting.   

The special agent was hesitant to discuss any conversations he may have had with Shapley on June 15, 2022, but said he had “no recollection of using the word ‘nonsense.’” 

Sobocinski also complained that the meeting “took much longer than what I expected.” 

“Literally, it could have lasted a half an hour; it felt like forever,” he said. 

Sobocinski noted more than a dozen times during his testimony that his primary goal was to “move the case to a resolution,” and he acknowledged that the five-year-long probe into the president’s son was dragging. 

“I would have liked for it to move faster,” he said. 

House Judiciary Committee spokesman Russell Dye told The Post that Shapley and fellow IRS whistleblower Joseph Ziegler “have been wholly consistent throughout their disclosures to Congress, and the only people who haven’t are people like David Weiss, Merrick Garland, and their liberal cronies.”

Attorneys for Shapley said Sobocinski’s testimony was less credible than Shapley’s own contemporaneously documented notes.

“The ‘minutia’ of tax law and the impending expiration of the 2014/2015 charges are the reason the October 7, 2022 meeting was scheduled to begin with, so sounds like SAC Sobociski wasn’t paying attention—while SSA Shapley was taking notes,” tweeted Tristan Leavitt, president of Empower Oversight, which represents Shapley.

Jason Foster, chairman of the pro-whistleblowing group, wrote, “The only question is how close to perjury others are willing to dance to tow the Garland/Weiss company line—while DOJ-minders watch them testify. ‘Don’t recall’ feels safe when folks are trying to keep their jobs.”

Shapley’s testimony about other aspects of an alleged cover-up in the case has been partially corroborated by Ziegler and by recently retired FBI Supervisory Special Agent Joe Gordon.