Amid long, uncomfortable pauses, Joe Biden struggled to recall when his son died, when he left office as vice president, what year Donald Trump was elected or why he had classified documents he shouldn't have had, according to audio Axios obtained of his October 2023 interviews with special counsel Robert Hur.
Why it matters: The newly released recordings of Biden having trouble recalling such details — while occasionally slurring words and muttering — shed light on why his White House refused to release the recordings last year, as questions mounted about his mental acuity.
- The audio also appears to validate Hur's assertion that jurors in a trial likely would have viewed Biden as "a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory."
- Partly based on that determination, Hur decided not to prosecute Biden for improper possession of classified documents, angering Republicans because Trump was facing charges in his own classified document scandal then.
- Democrats and Biden's White House blasted Hur for his observations about Biden. They repeatedly insisted he was "sharp" and that Hur was politically motivated. But the audio from the six hours of interviews indicates he and co-counsel Marc Krickbaum were respectful and friendly.
- Democratic leaders have struggled this week to respond to reports about a new book on that topic — "Original Sin," by Axios' Alex Thompson and CNN's Jake Tapper — that will be released Tuesday.
- The audio — from two three-hour sessions on Oct. 8 and 9, 2023 — adds voice and dimension to the transcripts of the interviews that the Justice Department made available in the weeks after Hur's report was released Feb. 8, 2024.
- Biden's White House refused to release the recordings last year, arguing they were protected "law enforcement materials" and that Republicans only wanted "to chop them up, distort them, and use them for partisan political purposes."....
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