Former President Joe Biden has initiated a lawsuit against the Trump Justice Department aimed at halting the release of audio recordings from private discussions with his ghostwriter. This material has raised concerns regarding his mental acuity and management of classified documents.
Filed in federal court on Tuesday, this legal action arrives just weeks ahead of a potential disclosure of the recordings and transcripts to Republican lawmakers and the conservative Heritage Foundation.
The recordings stem from approximately 70 hours of conversations Biden had in 2016 and 2017 while drafting his memoir, Promise Me, Dad, alongside biographer Mark Zwonitzer. The narrative of the book outlines Biden’s life during a challenging time when his son Beau was battling brain cancer.
These tapes became pivotal in Special Counsel Robert Hur’s investigation into Biden’s handling of classified materials. Although Hur concluded that Biden had read classified content aloud to Zwonitzer, he recommended against prosecution, suggesting that it would be challenging to prove willful misconduct due to Biden’s deteriorating memory.
The content of the recordings played a critical role in Hur’s politically charged February 2024 assessment, where he indicated that the then-81-year-old might be perceived as “an elderly man with a poor memory” by jurors. This description surfaced amid Biden’s re-election campaign, exacerbating doubts about his capability for another term.
Hur’s report noted instances where Biden informed Zwonitzer, “I just found all the classified stuff downstairs,” and revealed moments where he read journal entries containing classified intelligence nearly verbatim on three different occasions.
Further court documents suggest that Zwonitzer deleted some of the audio upon learning of Hur’s special counsel appointment in 2023, although investigators eventually retrieved the deleted material.
Donald Trump responded to Biden’s legal efforts on Truth Social, labeling his predecessor “A Crooked Politician!!!”
Biden’s legal team contends that the public release of the tapes would constitute “an unwarranted invasion of President Biden’s privacy.”
The lawyers asserted that every American, including those who have served as Vice President, is entitled to a degree of privacy regarding personal conversations within their homes.
They further highlighted that when the Justice Department gathers private information during a criminal investigation, it must protect that material from public exposure. Additionally, they emphasized that the recordings with the ghostwriter differ from Hur’s direct interviews with Biden, which he is also attempting to keep confidential.
Hur’s investigation commenced in January 2023 after classified documents tied to Biden’s vice presidency were uncovered at a former Washington office and his Wilmington home. He was appointed as special counsel by then-Attorney General Merrick Garland. Investigators found classified documents related to U.S. military and foreign policies in Afghanistan, alongside notebooks with Biden’s handwritten notes on national security.
Despite this evidence, Hur opted not to recommend charges, asserting that Biden would present as a sympathetic figure to a jury due to his age and memory issues.
Hur also remarked that it would be difficult to persuade a jury to convict a former president in his eighties of a serious felony requiring a mental state of willfulness.
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