West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice holds up his canine Babydog as he involves the tip of his State of the State speech within the Home chambers, on the West Virginia State Capitol in Charleston, W.Va., Thursday, Jan. 27, 2022.
Chris Dorst | Charleston Gazette | AP
The U.S. authorities on Monday sued Sen. Jim Justice, a West Virginia Republican, and his spouse for $5.1 million in unpaid federal earnings taxes, penalties, and curiosity courting to the 2009 tax submitting 12 months.
“Regardless of discover and demand for fee of the assessments …James C. Justice, II, and Cathy L. Justice have uncared for or refused to make full fee of these assessments to the USA,” the lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court docket in Beckley, West Virginia, alleged.
The lawsuit, filed by the Tax Division of the Division of Justice, asks a choose to enter a judgment in favor of the U.S. towards the couple within the quantity of $5,164,739.75, which was the quantity owed to the Inner Income Service as of Aug. 4, in accordance with the submitting.
The swimsuit was filed practically two months after the IRS reportedly filed notices of a tax lien for $8 million towards Justice in Greenbrier County, West Virginia. One of many notices referenced a tax evaluation dated Nov. 25, 2015 — the identical date because the evaluation referenced within the lawsuit filed Monday.
Politico, which broke the information of the tax lien on Oct. 10, famous then that the IRS web site says “typically the IRS can pursue assortment of a tax legal responsibility as much as 10 years from the date it was assessed. A Discover of Federal Tax Lien could also be filed any time inside that 10-year interval.”
Tuesday is the tip of a 10-year interval that will have started on Nov. 25, 2015.
Justice was elected to the Senate in November 2024, changing Sen. Joe Manchin, an impartial who give up the Democratic caucus earlier that 12 months.
The coal mining inheritor beforehand served as governor of West Virginia from 2017 till he entered the Senate in January.
The tax-related lawsuit comes weeks after a federal choose in Tennessee discovered Justice answerable for greater than $29 million in civil damages and prejudgment curiosity to Lexon Insurance coverage Firm over a breached surety-bond contract tied to his coal mining enterprise.
CNBC has requested touch upon the tax lawsuit from Justice’s Senate workplace and from attorneys who’ve represented him.