Joe Biden asserted executive privilege to block House Republicans from obtaining recordings of his interviews with Robert Hur, the special counsel who investigated Biden’s withholding of classified information following his time as a senator and as Barack Obama’s vice president.
On a Letter reported by the New York Times It is other points of sale On Thursday, White House counsel Edward Siskel told the Republican chairmen of the House Judiciary and Oversight committees: “The absence of a legitimate need for the audio recordings reveals their likely purpose – to cut them up, distort them and use them for partisan political purposes.
“Requiring the executive branch of such sensitive and constitutionally protected law enforcement materials because you want to manipulate them for potential political gain is inappropriate.”
The two presidents, Jim Jordan of Ohio (judiciary) and James Comer of Kentucky (oversight), both close allies of Donald Trump, led Republican efforts to ensnare Biden in damaging investigations, including an explosive impeachment.
Biden’s withholding of confidential information was discovered when Trump, Biden’s opponent in this year’s election, faced 40 criminal charges over the same matter.
Unlike Trump — who faces 48 other criminal charges and has been hit with multimillion-dollar civil sanctions — Biden cooperated with the special counsel appointed to investigate the matter.
Hur, who was appointed U.S. attorney by Trump, cleared Biden of any wrongdoing. But Hur caused an uproar when in his report he made repeated references to the 81-year-old president’s age, including saying that if he had brought charges, jurors would have seen Biden as “a friendly, well-intentioned elderly man with a poor memory.” ”.
Hur defended his work. Republicans clamored for access to recordings of Hur’s interviews with Biden, especially after Biden’s angry claims about what was said were contradicted by transcripts.
News organizations have processed to get the recordings.
In Congress, Republicans threatened to hold U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland in contempt after he rejected subpoenas for the recordings and other materials.
On a Letter for Biden, reported per the Times, Garland said turning over Hur’s interviews “would create an unacceptable risk” of undermining “similar high-profile criminal investigations — in particular, investigations in which the voluntary cooperation of White House officials is critically important.”
The Justice Department said the decision to suspend interviews was not made for partisan reasons.
Carlos Uriarte, assistant attorney general for legislative affairs, told Jordan and Comer: “It is a long-standing position of the executive branch held by administrations of both parties that an official who asserts the president’s claim of executive privilege cannot be prosecuted for criminal contempt of Congress.”
In response, House Republicans cited comments in February in which a Biden spokesperson said the president had “nothing to hide” and asked: “Why is Biden hiding behind executive privileges now?”
Comer said, “It’s a five-alarm fire in the White House… Today’s Hail Mary from the White House changes nothing for our committee.”
Jordan told reporters that the transcripts already released were not “sufficient evidence of the state of the president’s memory” and said: “This last-minute invocation does not change the fact that the attorney general did not comply with our subpoena.”
Jordan House Judiciary Committee later voted to move forward with contempt proceedings against Garland. The oversight committee should take up the matter.
Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung said Biden “and his feeble administration have hopelessly politicized the core constitutional principle of executive privilege, denying it to their political opponents while aggressively trying to use it to give Crooked political cover.” Joe.”
But Glenn Ivey, a Maryland Democrat who sits on the House judiciary committee, told the Times that the Republicans’ demands were “purely political.”
“The only reason they want the recording is to try to use clips for campaign ads, or something along those lines, which obviously doesn’t meet the legislative purpose standard that the Supreme Court has set for congressional oversight.”
