According to letters from the White House and Justice Department to House Republicans, President Joe Biden has claimed presidential privilege over the records of his interview with Special Counsel Robert Hur.
The audio tapes of Biden's interviews, Mark Zwonitzer, his ghostwriter, and other materials from Hur's inquiry into Biden's handling of sensitive material had already been subpoenaed by Republican senators.Attorney General Merrick Garland's contempt of Congress proceedings are set to commence on Thursday by the House Oversight and Judiciary committees due to his noncompliance with the subpoenas.
White House Counsel Edward Siskel wrote to House Oversight Chair James Comer and House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan, saying, "The President has decided to assert executive privilege over the recordings because of his longstanding commitment to protecting the integrity, effectiveness, and independence of the Department of Justice and its law enforcement investigations." The Department of Justice has already supplied the transcripts of the special counsel's interviews with Biden and his ghostwriter, the White House noted, and it has cooperated with all other requirements.
Siskel chastised Republicans for targeting prosecutors with whom they disagree and accused them of trying to tamper with the audio recordings. Siskel stated, "The lack of a valid reason for the audio recordings exposes your obvious intention, which is to disassemble, alter, and utilize them for partisan political ends." The DOJ requested that House Republicans postpone their planned contempt proceedings in response to the White House's claim of executive privilege.
Carlos Uriarte, Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legislative Affairs, wrote, "With the information you now have, the Committees ought not continue with contempt and should instead avoid unnecessary and unneeded controversy." "We have consistently made clear that revelation of the subpoenaed audio recordings would impair future law enforcement efforts and that the Committees' ongoing demands raise major separation of powers concerns," Uriarte said in defense of the necessity to retain the audio tapes.
In advance of Hur's appearance before the House Judiciary committee in March, the transcript of the two-day interview between Hur's team and Biden was made public.Hur stated that the president appeared to be a “sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory” during the interview but did not suggest filing charges against Biden in his report. a lawsuit in April to gain access to the interview tapes featuring Biden.
House Republicans have maintained, through their subpoenas to the DOJ, that the audio recordings are essential to their impeachment probe of Biden, which is still inactive because it seems improbable that the investigation will result in the senator's removal. Republicans are now unsure of how to conclude their investigation and are searching for methods to attack other Biden administration individuals in the absence of votes in their slim majority or proof of an impeachable violation.
Garland made remarks when it was revealed that Biden would invoke executive privilege, denouncing attacks on the Justice Department spearheaded by Republicans. At the Justice Department in Washington, DC, Garland told reporters, "The Justice Department is a crucial institution of our democracy." "People rely on us to make sure that our investigations and prosecutions are handled impartially, in accordance with the law, and the facts."
Republicans said in their contempt filings that the DOJ has no authority to decide what information is relevant to their probe and that the subtle verbal exchanges in an audio recording offer distinct perspectives on a topic that are not captured in a transcript.
According to the report, "the executive branch cannot tell Congress how to conduct its oversight or how to move forward with an impeachment inquiry in violation of the Constitution." Republicans counter in their report that although the interview transcripts capture the substance of the conversations, they fail to capture crucial nonverbal cues like pauses or delivery velocity, or verbal contexts like tone or tenor. Republicans assert that these deviations and pauses "may indicate whether the subject is purposefully providing evasive or nonresponsive testimony to investigators, or whether the witness is able to recall events."
Republicans cited a recent instance in which the president's audio recording and transcript disagreed, claiming that during a speech last month, Biden read aloud from a teleprompter cue, which was captured on tape but not in the original transcript of his words.
According to two people familiar with the preparations , the House Oversight Committee rescheduled its Thursday markup so that Republican committee members could attend the criminal trial of former President Donald Trump in New York City. An Oversight Committee spokesperson told that the timetable adjustment was necessary because of scheduling difficulties among members, adding that the markup would now begin at a later time to accommodate
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