Leon Black, a billionaire investor and art collector, is once again the subject of scrutiny for his relationship to Jeffrey Epstein, the late financier convicted of sex trafficking.
At the end of July, Ron Wyden, a Democratic senator from Oregon who sits on the Senate Finance Committee, called on the Internal Revenue Service to investigate what Wyden described as “suspicious transactions involving alleged tax planning work performed by Jeffrey Epstein” for Black.
In a letter to the IRS submitted on July 31, Wyden accused the organization of having “failed over the course of many years to audit major tax transactions involving Epstein,” and denounced what he described as “transactions amounting to tens of millions of dollars paid to a known criminal for the purpose of helping a mega-wealthy individual dodge billions in taxes.” Wyden called for the IRS to supply more information by September 1.
The letter was sent to Billy Long, who was appointed Commissioner of the IRS by Trump. On August 8, Trump replaced Long with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.
Black has previously been the subject of Epstein-related investigations. In 2020, Black wrote in a letter to shareholders at Apollo Global Management, the investment firm he cofounded, that he and Epstein had engaged in “estate planning, tax and philanthropic endeavors.” An investigation the next year found that Black was not involved in Epstein’s criminal activities, though it did state that Black had paid $158 million between 2012 and 2017.
A spokesperson for Black directed ARTnews to that investigation and said in a statement that the inquiry “concluded that Mr. Black had not engaged in any wrongdoing, had no awareness of Epstein’s criminal activity and all of the fees paid were for legitimate tax, estate and philanthropy planning services and were vetted and approved by outside law firms.”
Black is widely considered one of the world’s top art collectors, appearing on ARTnews’s Top 200 Collectors list each year since 1997. He was formerly the chair of the board at the Museum of Modern Art, a position he left as the Epstein proceedings continued on. He remains at trustee at the museum.
