Trump says release of audio of Hur interview with Biden up to Bondi

President Trump demurred Friday when asked about potentially releasing tapes of former President Biden’s interview with a special counsel that sparked questions about his memory, saying he hadn’t looked into it.

“I haven’t looked into that. That’s up to Pam and the group,” Trump, referring to Attorney General Pam Bondi, told reporters aboard Air Force One when asked whether he would release the tapes of the conversation between Biden and then-special counsel Robert Hur. “I haven’t really looked into it.”

“Look, everybody understands the condition of him,” the president continued. “I know people that are 89, 90, 92, 93 years old and are literally perfect. But Joe was not one of them, and they did a lot of hiding. They were, they were really playing games. And, you know, you can’t do that. Our country’s at stake.”

Politico reported earlier this month that the Trump administration was planning to release the audio of Biden’s interview. Hur had been investigating Biden’s handling of classified documents.

Hur wrote in his final report last year on the investigation that a jury would likely find Biden to be a “sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory,” setting off questions at the time about Biden’s cognitive abilities.

A transcript of the interview with Hur was released last year. But the Justice Department under Biden rebuffed requests from some Republicans for the audio recordings.

Biden’s mental sharpness has been back in the headlines because of an upcoming book from CNN’s Jake Tapper and Axios’s Alex Thompson. “Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again” details the extent to which the previous administration sought to obscure the degree of the Democratic president’s decline while in office.

Biden ultimately dropped out of the 2024 presidential race last July, opening the door for then-Vice President Harris to run against Trump.