A Democratic lawmaker from Illinois wants the FBI to open a probe targeting billionaire investor Carl Icahn for violating conflict of interest laws during his time as an adviser to President Donald Trump.
Icahn used his working relationship with Trump to push an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rule change that would have benefited his refining business, Democratic Sen. Tammy Duckworth wrote in a letter Wednesday to FBI Director Christopher Wray.
“It appears Mr. Icahn potentially violated the principal criminal conflict of interest statute … [and] abused his role as a special advisor to the president of the United States on issues relating to regulatory reform,” Duckworth noted.
She alleges that Icahn, whose Icahn Enterprises owns 82 percent of refiner CVR Energy, tried pushing Trump into removing the requirement that fuel refiners buy credits if they don’t blend enough biofuels.
CVR Energy accumulated a large short position in biofuel credits called Renewable Identification Numbers or RINs, which refiners are required to purchase. CVR Energy would have profited greatly if the price of RINs tumbled.
RIN prices dropped after Icahn proposed the change in biofuels regulation. CVR Energy posted a net gain of $6.4 million shortly after the proposal in the first quarter of this year — a $50 million turnaround from the period one year ago.
Duckworth is not the only Democrat openly calling for investigations into Icahn’s relationship with the president. Sens. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, among others, wrote a letter in May to the Security Exchange Commission asking the agency to pursue Icahn’s activities in the biofuels market.
The billionaire investor denied the accusations earlier this year and suggested Trump’s opponents were using “fake news” tactics to dismiss reformations of the EPA’s Renewable Fuel Standard. Icahn’s denials have not placated Duckworth.
“Our nation relies on the FBI to combat major white-collar crime and public corruption that undermines public trust in government,” she wrote in her letter to Wray.
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