The Vindication of the IRS Whistleblowers

 by Kim Strassel

Donald Trump’s storming of Washington isn’t leaving much time for nuance, yet distinctions matter. A case in point is the vindication of Internal Revenue Service whistleblowers Gary Shapley and Joseph Ziegler, a story that answers at least one big question.

Why is the president fundamentally uprooting the federal bureaucracy—cutting whole teams, firing senior employees, imposing new work rules? Our polarized political environment offers opposing partisan explanations. The left: A vengeful leader targets hardworking civil servants to make way for loyalists. The right: Mr. Trump is belatedly draining a swamp entirely filled with lazy liberal drones.

Think instead of Washington’s 2.4 million workforce as the political version of a terribly run company. It has its fair share of hard workers—dedicated to the job, the mission, the law. But they are undermined by the usual self-promoters and get-byers, with the added toxicity of embedded partisans and hidden power players. Why overturn the system? It’s the only way to elevate the good ones.

That is what’s happened in the case of Messrs. Shapley and Ziegler, veteran civil servants who were promoted this week to senior jobs, advising Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent on IRS reform. This comes after years of retaliation, for their sin of treating Hunter Biden like any other lawbreaker—for doing their job well—and for calling foul when colleagues put politics ahead of honest work.

To reprise: Mr. Shapley was an experienced IRS agent when brought in to supervise the Biden investigation in 2020. Under him was the similarly experienced Mr. Ziegler, who’d initiated the Hunter tax case around 2018 after viewing suspicious accounts. Mr. Ziegler had already encountered political interference, including a decision to park the tax case with David Weiss, the U.S. attorney for Delaware, even though Hunter filed taxes in California and the District of Columbia.

The two witnessed far more. Mr. Shapley’s team was thwarted in attempts to search Joe Biden’s guest house (Hunter’s onetime residence) and a storage facility containing Hunter business documents. The team was instructed not to ask questions about Joe or pursue leads connected to Joe’s grandchildren. It was slow-walked, made to ignore campaign-finance allegations and to strip Hunter’s name from document requests. FBI headquarters even tipped Hunter’s people to a coming round of interviews, allowing the subjects to lawyer up and refuse to talk.

Through it all, Messrs. Shapley and Ziegler worked the system, stuck with the process, tried to do the right thing—and prepared a document in late 2021 recommending Hunter be charged with felony tax violations covering numerous years. Mr. Weiss’s office in 2022 started negotiating with California and D.C. prosecutors about charges, and things crept along—until Mr. Shapley reached his breaking point.

Attorney General Merrick Garland assured the Senate in April 2022 that Mr. Weiss was calling the shots, operating free of “interference of any political or improper kind”—suggesting he’d get what charges he wanted, where he wanted. But Mr. Shapley testified that in an October 2022 meeting, Mr. Weiss stunned investigators by saying there would be no tax charges because he was “not the deciding person.” The U.S. attorneys for D.C. and central California, Biden appointees, refused to bring them.

In Mr. Shapley’s view, Messrs. Garland and Weiss were misleading the public by claiming the probe was independent. In addition to contacting inspectors general and the Office of Special Counsel, which investigates retaliation against whistleblowers, Mr. Shapley’s counsel approached Democratic and Republican leaders of congressional committees. Mr. Ziegler later joined him in appearing for testimony and pursuing retaliation claims.

The retaliation was intense and is a vital part of this story, as it explains the need for root-and-branch change. Messrs. Shapley and Ziegler might have got out the unseemly story of government “work” gone bad, but nothing happened to the rotten apples. They remained in place, protected, free over ensuing years to make the pair’s IRS jobs hell.

As documented in a complaint to the Merit Systems Protection Board, the duo have been undermined, ignored and kept down. Both were exiled from the Hunter case. Mr. Shapley was denied a job leading a unit he’d helped create and supervise—then denied three more positions. Even the OSC investigation into their claims proved difficult, given Mr. Biden named Hampton Dellinger—former Hunter law colleague—as OSC head. (He recused himself, and Mr. Trump has fired him.) To this day, the retaliators sit in their government offices. Message to good employees: Don’t do the right thing.

Until now. Messrs. Shapley and Ziegler continue with their Merit Systems Protection Board complaint; their new positions aren’t part of some settlement. Instead, the Trump administration is recognizing the value of their knowledge and commitment to good government work. Credit goes to Sen. Chuck Grassley, and Reps. Jim Jordan, James Comer and Jason Smith, who saw their stories through to this successful end.

Messrs. Shapley and Ziegler have been vindicated many times—by the ultimate Hunter prosecutions, his guilty pleas, and even his pardon, an additional ignominy on the Bidens. But the ultimate vindication—for them and taxpayers—is rewarding their integrity and dedication, making it a model for the federal workforce while clearing out the rot. They are the reason the Trump upset is necessary.

https://www.wsj.com/opinion/the-shapley-ziegler-vindication-irs-whistleblowers-7df735a5