On Thursday, President Joe Biden claimed that the recording of his interview with Special Counsel Robert Hur regarding his retention of classified documents should not be released due to executive privilege just hours before House Republicans were set to move toward holding Attorney General Merrick Garland in contempt of Congress for not releasing the recordings.
It has been noted that the Justice Department’s Legal Counsel Office stated that the recording should be considered protected by executive privilege, and Garland should not be punished for not releasing it, Associate Attorney General Carlos Uriatre said.
“I write to inform you that the President has asserted executive privilege over the requested audio recordings and is making a protective assertion of privilege over any remaining materials responsive to the subpoenas that have not already been produced,” Uriatre wrote in a letter Thursday as per CNN.
“It is the longstanding position of the executive branch held by administrations of both parties that an official who asserts the president’s claim of executive privilege cannot be held in contempt of Congress,” he also wrote, per the Associated Press.
The classified documents probe did not result in any charges being brought against the president, with Hur’s report concluding that a jury would likely find him to be a “sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.”
House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer said Biden’s executive privilege claim would not change his committee’s efforts to hold Garland in contempt.
“It’s a five-alarm fire at the White House. Clearly President Biden and his advisors fear releasing the audio recordings of his interview because it will again reaffirm to the American people that President Biden’s mental state is in decline. The House Oversight Committee requires these recordings as part of our investigation of President Biden’s mishandling of classified documents,” Comer said in a statement posted to X.
