Twitter Files journalist Matt Taibbi revealed he is under investigation by the Biden administration Internal Revenue Service that was opened Dec. 24, 2022 on the "same day" as the Twitter Files 9 that detailed government collusion with old Twitter.
"The IRS opened a case on me on a Saturday, Christmas Eve 2022, which just happened to coincide with a major Twitter Files report on FBI/intelligence community ties to tech platforms," Taibbi tweeted Wednesday. "This is revealed in a new letter to the IRS Commissioner by House Judiciary Chair @Jim_Jordan."
The letter dated Wednesday from Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, to IRS Commissioner Daniel Werfel noted the IRS responses to a March 27 inquiry "raise more questions than they answer."
"It is unclear from the documents along why the IRS opened its examination of Mr. Taibbi's tax return on such an unusual date or whether it coincided intentionally with Mr. Taibbi's reporting about government censorship," Jordan's latest letter to Werfel read Wednesday.
Taibbi and Jordan have been public about an IRS field visit March 9 to Taibbi's home address on "the very day" he was testifying before Congress.
Jordan's letter requests further information from the IRS for congressional oversight with a deadline of June 7:
- Documents and information related to the opening of the case into Taibbi's 2018 tax returns, including "whether it was related in any way to reporting on the Twitter Files."
- Documents and information related to the March 9 home visit and "whether or not the IRS was aware" Taibbi was testifying before Congress that day.
- Documents and information referring to or related to Twitter Files from Oct. 1, 2022 to the present.
- Documents and information on IRS protocols for its investigations.
Taibbi "consented" to the disclosures, Jordan wrote, and the Twitter Files author himself tweeted the revelations of the opening of the probe on Christmas Eve, a Saturday, and the same day of Twitter Files 9.
Taibbi outlined "My Crazy IRS Case" in a substack report Wednesday.
"Saturday, December 24, 2022 was one of the most memorable, and most panicked, days of my life," he wrote. "I spent Christmas Eve last year alone, holed up in the Parc 55 hotel in San Francisco, frantically trying to put together what I thought was the most explosive of the Twitter Files reports, 'Twitter and Other Government Agencies.'
"My wife and children were due to arrive for Christmas the next day, and I spent the morning checking and re-checking a story I knew might make people upset."
Notably, as Taibbi and Jordan reveal, the IRS investigation only found the U.S. government would owe Taibbi money, instead of the other way around. In the probe, the IRS would "check to see if I had hunting and fishing licenses or 'a concealed weapon'."
"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," Taibbi concluded.