That's not really what happened if you read the article. The Bush admin created a deliberate hole in the program to allow investors to convert holding to Roths. It's a weaponized tax shelter program. And it's one that can be exploited over and over. This is less a story that Thiel broke the rules and more that Republican policy used a clever trick to allow this to happen. You can still blame this on Thiel in a roundabout way since he is such a heavy Republican donor, this seems like a pretty straightforward case of regulatory capture.