Comer blasts DOJ for refusing to release audio of Hur’s Biden interview

House Oversight and Accountability Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) on Monday dug into the Department of Justice for its refusal to hand over the unreacted materials related to special counsel Robert Hur’s investigation into President Biden’s handling of classified records.

“The Biden Administration does not get to determine what Congress needs and does not need for its oversight of the executive branch. It’s curious the Biden Administration is refusing to release the audio of President Biden’s interview with the Special Counsel after releasing the transcript. Why shouldn’t the American people be able to hear the actual audio of his answers?” Comer wrote in a statement Monday.

His remarks came hours after the Justice Department (DOJ) sent a letter to him and House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), urging them to “avoid conflict” after they threatened the possibility of contempt proceedings to gain information into Hur’s investigation into Biden and his handling of classified documents.

The letter, from the DOJ’s head of legislative affairs, told the Republican chairs their committees already received the information requested when they asked for the transcripts of Hur’s interview with Biden, along with a recording of the conversation.

The committees also asked for some of the classified documents and communications with Biden’s attorneys.

That information may not have substantiated the concerns the Committees articulated, but it does appear to help resolve them and your inquiry,” Assistant Attorney General Carlos Uriarte wrote in the letter.

The chairs could have requested the information for “political purposes that should have no role” in deciding which files should be shared.

Jordan and Comer are looking to connect Hur’s inquiry into Biden to their impeachment inquiry into the president. The committees have struggled in recent weeks to close their impeachment probe into Biden and are facing rising doubts from their own party about whether investigators discovered any wrongdoing.

The House GOP’s formal impeachment inquiry was intended to add legal weight to their claims, which center on allegations Biden was involved with his son, Hunter Biden’s, foreign business deals.

These claims were further challenged after an FBI informant who accused President Biden of taking a bribe as vice president was arrested and indicted for allegedly fabricating the claim and making false statements to the bureau.

The letter is in response to the two chairs’ threat to hold contempt proceedings against Attorney General Merrick Garland last month.

The Justice Department shared the transcript of Hur’s interview with Biden on March 12 but did not turn over the prized audio recordings Republicans demanded.

Uriarte’s letter on Monday argued the committees’ focus on the information he claims the department “already gave” them suggests the requests are “to serve political purposes.” He argued the chairs would have difficulty showing the legislative purpose behind their requests for the audio files.