Justice Department officials told House Republicans they don\u2019t intend to provide audio recordings of President Biden\u2019s interviews with the special counsel who investigated his handling of classified documents \u2014 suggesting that since lawmakers already have the transcripts of those interviews, the request was more about scoring political points than seeking information.<\/p>\n
Carlos Uriarte, a senior Justice Department official, sent the letter to Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, and Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.) the chairman of the House Oversight and Accountability Committee.<\/p>\n
Their demand for the recordings, after already having the transcripts, \u201cindicates that the Committees\u2019 interest may not be in receiving information in service of legitimate oversight or investigatory functions, but to serve political purposes that should have no role in the treatment of law enforcement files,\u201d Uriarte wrote in the letter sent on Monday.<\/p>\n
Biden was questioned in October by then-special counsel Robert K. Hur about the classified documents, which were found in 2022 at the president\u2019s Wilmington, Del., home and an office he used after his vice presidency. Their discussion, which unfolded over two days, played a key role in Hur\u2019s determination not to seek charges against Biden.<\/p>\n
In his final report, Hur found some evidence that Biden willfully retained classified government materials after he left the vice presidency in 2017 but concluded that there was not enough proof to justify criminal charges. He said that part of his decision was influenced by the consideration that, if prosecuted after his presidency, Biden could be viewed sympathetically, as an elderly but well-meaning man with a failing memory.<\/p>\n
Republicans have seized on that characterization.<\/p>\n
Jordan and Comer have threatened to hold Attorney General Merrick Garland in contempt if the department doesn\u2019t turn over the audio recordings, but Uriarte said the GOP lawmakers\u2019 anger is unfair, given how much material from the Hur investigation has already been given to them.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Committees\u2019 reaction is difficult to explain in terms of any lack of information or frustration of any informational or investigative imperative, given the Department\u2019s actual conduct,\u201d Uriarte wrote. \u201cWe are therefore concerned that the Committees are disappointed not because you didn\u2019t receive information, but because you did.\u201d<\/p>\n
Uriarte said the Republicans should \u201cavoid conflict rather than seek it.\u201d<\/p>\n
The letter also warned that turning over the recordings could have a chilling effect on future attempts by the Justice Department to interview other high-profile people or officials for sensitive investigations.<\/p>\n
Prosecutors \u201cmight have a harder time obtaining consent to an interview at all,\u201d Uriarte wrote, \u201cIt is clearly not in the public interest to render such cooperation with prosecutors and investigators less likely in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n
In addition to the transcripts of the Biden interviews, the Justice Department has given Congress transcripts of Hur\u2019s interview with Biden\u2019s former ghostwriter, whose conduct became an important focus of the classified-documents probe. Republican lawmakers are also seeking the audio recordings of those interviews.<\/p>\n
Hur\u2019s investigation found that after Biden finished his term as vice president, he shared with the ghostwriter some of the classified information he had written years earlier in notebooks.<\/p>\n
The ghostwriter also admitted to investigators that he had deleted some recordings of his book-writing conversations with Biden after he learned there was an investigation, but Hur ultimately concluded no charges against the ghostwriter were warranted because the transcripts of those conversations were not destroyed.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Justice Department officials told House Republicans they don\u2019t intend to provide audio recordings of President Biden\u2019s interviews with the special counsel who investigated his handling of classified documents \u2014 suggesting that since lawmakers already have the transcripts of those interviews, the request was more about scoring political points than seeking information. Carlos Uriarte, a senior […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":2909,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2908","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2908","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2908"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2908\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2909"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2908"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2908"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2908"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}