On Friday, Axios released audio of Robert Hur and Joe Biden. Most Americans have already seen the transcripts of Special Counsel Robert Hur’s interview with Joe Biden as he investigated classified documents discovered in his garage. However, the written format of Biden’s responses do not convey the slow, meandering way he spoke.
Democrats were gaslighting the country to hide the truth about Joe Biden’s cognitive decline. In the audio, Robert Hur is actually very patient and kind to Biden, yet Democratic politicians were attacking him. In a final report, Hur called Biden, 81 at the time, “a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.”
Hindsight is always 20/20, so after hearing Hur and Biden interacting in the audio, it’s clear that Hur wasn’t “attacking” Biden when he wrote that. Instead, he was trying to convey the idea that he didn’t feel it was appropriate to bring charges against—and a jury wouldn’t be objective in a trial where the defendant is—an 81-year-old man in cognitive decline.
That’s how I interpret it, at least. Leave your thoughts on this audio released by Axios in the comments below. The following is an excerpt from the Axios article that accompanies the release of this audio (in video format) Friday evening.
Why This Audio Matters
From Axios: 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.
The big picture: The audio surfaces as Democrats and the national media are grappling with the legacy of Biden’s White House and campaign hiding his decline as he ran for another four-year term at age 81.
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.”
