The Trump administration is considering releasing the audio of former President Joe Biden’s interview with special counsel Robert Hur during Hur’s 2023 investigation into Biden’s handling of classified documents, sources familiar with the matter confirm to ABC News.
Trump’s White House lawyers were provided the audiotape by the Department of Justice weeks ago, the sources said.
The transcript of the interviews was released in 2024, so the release of the audio wouldn’t reveal anything new that Biden told the special counsel — but it would be the first time Biden is himself heard on the tape.
The release would come as the Trump administration is simultaneously fighting to keep former special counsel Jack Smith’s report on Trump’s handling of classified documents under wraps.
President Joe Biden speaks on the Senate’s recent passage of the National Security Supplemental Bill, which provides military aid to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, at the White House, Feb. 13, 2024. United States Attorney Robert Hur speaks at a news conference about the indictment of Kevin Merrill, Jay Ledford, and Cameron Jezierski by a Maryland grand jury at the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Sept. 19, 2018, in Baltimore.
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Hur’s yearlong probe into Biden’s handling of classified documents ended with no criminal charges being recommended because the evidence wasn’t sufficient to support a conviction, Hur said. However, the 388-page report Hur released created a political firestorm as the special counsel described Biden as someone who could appear to a jury as an “elderly man with a poor memory.”
Hur, in his report, repeatedly pointed to moments from his interview where he said Biden appeared to have trouble remembering the years he served as vice president and when his son Beau died.
Republicans on Capitol Hill had been seeking access to the audio recording of Hur’s interview of Biden as part of their now-defunct impeachment probe into the then-president.
