WASHINGTON – The IRS special agents who made protected disclosures on the preferential treatment that the Biden administration was giving the president’s son, Hunter Biden, during an investigation into his tax returns, will be promote to leadership positions and become the senior advisors to the Secretary of the Department of Treasury. The announcement was made by Senator Chuck Grassley, chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Grassley has been a champion for the whistleblowers since they made protected disclosures to Congress.
Supervisory Special Agent Gary Shapley is being promoted to Deputy Chief of IRS Criminal Investigations and assigned to the Treasury Secretary’s office as a senior advisor for IRS reform. Special Agent Joseph Ziegler is receiving a promotion and is also being assigned to the secretary’s office as a senior advisor for IRS reform.
The whistleblowers, who will begin work in the secretary’s office immediately, praised Secretary Scott Bessent and Grassley for their work to ensure the whistleblowers find space within the agency to ensure they are not further retaliated against.
Statement by Gary Shapley, supervisory special agent, and Joseph Ziegler, special agent
“We are enormously grateful to Secretary Bessent and Senator Grassley and all of the members of Congress for their leadership. We have been motivated by one singular mantra: do what’s right. It’s never been easy, and there have been more pitfalls than one would hope, but we appreciate the opportunity Secretary Bessent is giving us to utilize our skills and firsthand knowledge of the agency to further the work of the administration to root out waste and fraud from the federal government and make a difference.”
Statement by Tristan Leavitt and Jason Foster of Empower Oversight, attorneys for Gary Shapley
“Gary and Joe have never been motivated by accolades, just an underlying desire to do what was right. This opportunity provided to them by Secretary Bessent will allow them to use their deep skill set and understanding of how the IRS works from top to bottom to help solve some of the ingrained issues within the agency. Secretary Bessent should be applauded for his willingness to step up and bring these two courageous whistleblowers into leadership positions within the agency. Senator Grassley has never wavered from his support of Gary and Joe, and we appreciate everything he and chairmen Smith, Comer and Jordan have done to ensure that they are able to use their skills to assist the administration.”
Statement by Dean Zerbe of Zerbe, Miller, Fingeret law firm, attorney for Joseph Ziegler
“On behalf of my client Joe Ziegler, I want to thank Treasury Secretary Bessent for promoting Joe and Gary Shapley into key positions advising the Secretary on how to bring efficiencies and improvements at the IRS going forward. Joe and Gary have through their work and sacrifices made clear their commitment to tax administration that is fair and impartial. Career IRS employees as well as taxpayers should be heartened by the good news of Joe and Gary’s promotion. The two bring years of first-hand experience and knowledge of what works and doesn’t work at the IRS. An enormous thank you to Chairman Grassley, Senator Johnson, Chairman Comer, Chairman Jordan and Chairman Smith for their tremendous support for Joe and Gary throughout. Finally, a thank you to President Trump for changing the culture in Washington – that disruptors should be promoted not punished.”
Background
In 2018, Ziegler, while reviewing bank records, uncovered payments tied to Hunter Biden that suggested tax evasion and possible links to prostitution rings. Ziegler opened a criminal tax investigation, expecting standard IRS procedures to apply. He quickly noticed deviations such as the Delaware U.S. Attorney’s Office and DOJ Tax Division resisted typical investigative steps, like interviewing Hunter Biden or executing search warrants, often citing political sensitivities—especially as Joe Biden’s 2020 presidential campaign gained momentum.
When Shapley became Ziegler’s supervisor in January 2020, the two escalated their concerns within IRS-CI (criminal investigations), documenting what they believed was “abuse of authority” and “gross mismanagement.” They reported that DOJ officials slow-walked the case, avoided charging decisions in jurisdictions overseen by Biden appointees, and even scrubbed Hunter Biden’s name from search warrants. By late 2021, despite evidence supporting six years of tax charges, the investigation stalled as political pressure mounted.
Shapley and Ziegler’s internal complaints went nowhere—senior IRS officials distanced themselves from the case, leaving Shapley to shoulder unprecedented responsibilities. Frustrated, the whistleblowers took their concerns to Congress, the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA), and the DOJ Office of Inspector General in 2022 and 2023, actions all protected under federal whistleblower laws.
After a tense October 2022 meeting where Shapley confronted Weiss about case mishandling, DOJ demanded the IRS remove both agents from the investigation. The IRS complied in May 2023, sidelining Shapley and Ziegler despite their stellar records. Shapley was passed over for a prestigious Joint Chiefs of Global Tax Enforcement (J5) leadership role he was uniquely qualified for, while both faced marginalization, reduced duties, and a “cascading series of retaliatory actions.”
After 20 months of investigation, the Office of Special Counsel (OSC) recently found the IRS had illegally gagged and retaliated against the whistleblowers. OSC determined that IRS gag orders violated federal law by omitting required language protecting whistleblower rights to speak to Congress or inspectors general. The IRS was forced to retract those orders, but the damage to Shapley and Ziegler’s careers persisted. The OSC also found that the IRS could not support its decision to remove the whistleblowers from the Hunter Biden case for any legitimate, nonretaliatory purpose.
Legal Activities
- Shapley and Ziegler have also filed a defamation lawsuit against Biden attorney Abbe Lowell, alleging that Lowell republished false statements about them that damaged their reputation and caused them irreparable harm.The suit alleges that the statements Lowell republished, made by Biden family lawyers in letters encouraging the Administration of their client’s father to prosecute Shapley and Ziegler, falsely accused the whistleblowers of breaking the law. The letters were part of a well-funded campaign launched to smear Shapley and Ziegler after they made protected whistleblower disclosures to Congress.
- Empower Oversight has filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) for failing to respond to multiple Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests for its communications related to IRS whistleblowers Supervisory Special Agent (SSA) Gary Shapley and Special Agent (SA) Joe Ziegler and the protected disclosures they made to Congress dating back to 2023.
- Shapley and Ziegler continue to work to intervene in Hunter Biden’s lawsuit against the IRS where he claims that his taxpayer privacy had been violated. The case was assigned to DOJ’s Tax Division—one of the offices Shapley and Ziegler had blown the whistle on. The Tax Division initially failed to defend against the false allegations, omitting any mention of the whistleblower provision in the taxpayer privacy laws and only belatedly burying in a footnote that DOJ did not believe the whistleblowers broke the law. Because of DOJ’s failure to vigorously defend against the lawsuit, Empower Oversight wrote to Attorney General Merrick Garland requesting additional DOJ communications, and SSA Shapley and SA Ziegler ultimately moved to intervene in Hunter Biden’s lawsuit. The motion was denied, which Shapley and Ziegler are appealing.