“I did not exonerate him and that word does not appear in the report,” Hur corrected Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) during a five-hour-long House Judiciary Committee hearing on Capitol Hill.
Jayapal, the influential chairwoman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, spoke over Hur as he corrected her before she cut him off by saying, “Mr. Hur, it’s my time. Thank you.”
Hur testified that Biden lied at least twice to the public; once when claiming he had not shared classified information with a ghostwriter and again when the president alleged that he had locked up the documents in question — and Hur also revealed that the White House counsel’s office had sought to purge his report of negative assessments of Biden’s mental fitness.
Hur wrote in his bombshell report, released Feb. 8, that he had uncovered evidence that Biden “willfully retained and disclosed classified materials” but found that the 81-year-old should not face charges for hoarding the nation’s secrets over a span of decades on the grounds that jurors would likely see him as a “well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.”
The ex-special counsel further stated that Biden made a number of false statements about the investigation at a bellicose Feb. 8 White House press conference following the release of the report, during which Biden, who is seeking a second term in the November election, insisted: “I know what the hell I’m doing.”
Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-Fla.) read from a transcript of the presser, when Biden defended his mental acuity and his stashing of documents at his homes and at an unlocked DC office provided by the University of Pennsylvania.
“Question: ‘Mr. President, why did you share classified information with your ghostwriter?’” Gaetz narrated.
“The president: ‘I did not share classified information. I did not share it. I guarantee I did not.’ That’s not true, is it, Mr. Hur?” Gaetz asked
“That is inconsistent with the findings based on the evidence in my report,” said Hur.
“So it is a lie — just what regular people would say, right?” Gaetz said.
“Yeah,” Hur said with a chuckle.
Gaetz read another of Biden’s claims that “all of the stuff that was in my home was in filing cabinets that were locked or able to be locked” — with the congressman adding, “That wasn’t true either, was it?”
“That was inconsistent with the findings of our investigation,” Hur said again.
Gaetz read another of Biden’s claims that “all of the stuff that was in my home was in filing cabinets that were locked or able to be locked” — with the congressman adding, “That wasn’t true either, was it?”
“Another lie, people might say, right?” Gaetz went on. “Because what you put in your report was, ‘among the places Mr. Biden’s lawyers found classified documents in the garage was a damaged open box.’”
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Shortly before the hearing, the Justice Department released transcripts of Biden’s two interviews with Hur and his team on Oct. 8-9, 2023, which confirmed the special counsel’s account of Biden presenting himself as confused on multiple points.
The transcripts revealed that Biden said his son Beau, who died in 2015, was “deployed or is dying” after he left office in 2017.