BREAKING NEWS: Biden-Hur Audio Released
A new audio clip from an October 2023 interview between former President Joe Biden and Special Counsel Robert Hur has been released by Axios. In this clip, Biden seems to have difficulty providing clear answers.
According to a recent court filing, Biden’s legal team plans to challenge the Justice Department’s release of edited transcripts and audio from talks he had with his book’s ghostwriter back in 2017. The Assistant Attorney General’s Division for Civil Affairs mentioned that “President Biden has communicated through his attorney that he intends to seek intervention” to stop these disclosures. This follows a Freedom of Information Act request made by Mike Howell of the Heritage Foundation, which the department is not opposing.
Biden’s attorneys have a deadline set for Tuesday to respond to this release concerning Howell’s FOIA request. If they don’t object, the 70 hours of edited recordings could be released shortly after that. If there is an objection submitted, then the release would be postponed until June 15.
During the 2017 interview with his ghostwriter for the book “Dad, Promise Me: A Year of Hope, Hardship, and Purpose,” the audio was captured as part of special counsel Robert Hur’s investigation into Biden’s handling of classified documents—specifically documents located in his garage and at the Penn Biden Center post-Obama administration.
TJ Ducklo, a press secretary for Biden, stated that the president is cooperating fully but insists that the audio of his conversations with biographers should remain private. He also emphasized that the Department of Justice has stated that the tapes aren’t deemed to be in the public interest.
Federal Judge Blocks Publication of Volume 2 of the Jack Smith Report
Ducklo has expressed that the current situation is more about political maneuvering than transparency. He argued that if the administration genuinely valued transparency, it would disclose Volume 2 of Special Counsel Jack Smith’s report regarding Donald Trump’s purported mishandling of classified information, which Ducklo believes the public deserves to see.
Howell, from the Heritage Oversight Project, claims these tapes could undermine confidence in Biden’s qualifications for the presidency and reveal that he shared classified information. He suggested that the delays in releasing information indicate a lack of transparency.
Amid ongoing negotiations, it seems Biden may have changed his approach, withholding even those records that directly correspond to claims in the Hur report, according to Shumate’s recent filing.
The potential intervention by Biden and the possibility of releasing information to the House Judiciary Committee raise some questions. It appears that Biden’s legal team has not been responsive and has been accused of delaying the process.
In a rather pressing update, the Justice Department pointed out a new warning regarding Tuesday’s deadline, emphasizing that public access to these records is crucial. Howell asserted that Biden’s legal team has not adequately engaged on this issue, leading to postponements in discussions.
