The Internal Revenue Service commissioner has requested that the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration investigate how ex-FBI leaders James Comey and Andrew McCabe were both subjected to a very rare intensive audit, the tax agency said on Thursday.
Commissioner Charlies Rettig, who led the agency during Comey and McCabe’s audits and who was appointed by ex-President Donald Trump, reached out to the IG’s office “personally” to look into the matter, according to the IRS.
The moves came a day after the New York Times reported that Comey and McCabe, some of Trump’s biggest foes, were both selected for an intensive tax audit called the National Research Program in 2019 and 2021, respectively.
Very few Americans ever have to face the program; only a few thousand people get chosen each year.
Comey and McCabe told the Times that they were unaware that the other had dealt with the same audit until they were contacted about it by a reporter.
The IRS has denied the notion that the two former FBI officials had been deliberately targeted, and said that Rettig has no role in that audit selection process.
“Commissioner Rettig is not involved in individual audits or taxpayer cases; those are handled by career civil servants,” the agency said after the news broke this week. “As IRS commissioner, he has never been in contact with the White House –- in either administration –- on IRS enforcement or individual taxpayer matters.”
McCabe, who previously called for an investigation into the matter, told CNN on Thursday that the IRS had taken “the right step” by reaching out to the inspector general.
“But let’s see if the IG moves on it and then makes their findings public,” he added.
