Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee are in court on Monday, Oct. 28, against Attorney General Merrick Garland. The case stems from a lawsuit filed in July seeking the release of audio recordings of President Joe Biden’s interview with special counsel Robert Hur during the Department of Justice’s investigation into Biden’s handling of classified documents.
Hur’s investigation concluded without recommending criminal charges against the president, but his findings sparked controversy. In his 345-page report, Hur described Biden as “an elderly man with a poor memory.”
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“My task was to determine whether the president retained or disclosed national defense information willfully,” Hur said during his testimony in front of the House committee. “I could not make that determination without assessing the president’s state of mind. My assessment of the president’s memory was necessary and accurate and fair.”
Hur’s report questioned Biden’s age and mental competence. According to Hur, Biden expressed confusion during the interview, particularly regarding significant dates, such as the timing of his son Beau’s death.
Biden, the White House and fellow Democrats expressed dissatisfaction with Hur’s portrayal. Vice President Kamala Harris called it “politically motivated.” Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee criticized Hur for not recommending charges.
Seeking more information about Biden’s answers, the committee called for the release of the audio recordings. Although the transcript of the interview was released, Republicans argued that it was insufficient.
In June, the House voted to hold Garland in contempt of Congress after the White House refused to provide the audio, asserting executive privilege over the recordings.
“Audio recordings are better evidence than transcripts of what happened during the special counsel’s interviews with President Biden,” the GOP lawsuit states. “For example, they contain verbal and nonverbal context that is missing from a cold transcript. That verbal and nonverbal context is quite important here because the special counsel relied on the way that President Biden presented himself during their interview — ‘as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory’ — when ultimately recommending that President Biden should not be prosecuted for unlawfully retaining and disclosing classified information.”
Meanwhile, the Justice Department is asking the court to dismiss the case, arguing that “the committee’s vanishingly small informational needs come nowhere close to overcoming the assertion of privilege. For these reasons, the court should rule in favor of the department.”