A full transcript of the Hur interview, in which Special Counsel Robert Hur pressed President Joe Biden about how he handled classified documents found in his position from his time as Vice President, was released on Tuesday. That full transcript of the five-hour interview prevents a very worrisome portrait of President Biden’s mental health.
Particularly, the transcript shows that, among other things, President Biden had issues remembering when he served as Obama’s Vice President and stopped being VP, when Beau Biden, his son, died of cancer, or even what a fax machine was. He also had trouble remembering when former President Donald Trump was elected president.
At one point, for instance, Biden brought up the death of his son Beau Biden, struggling to recall when that occurred. Biden said, “Well, um … I, I, I, I, I don’t know. This is what, 2017, 2018, that area?” Hur simply said, “Yes.”
Biden, continuing, said, “Remember, in this timeframe my son is — either been deployed or is dying … And, and so what was happening, though — what month did Beau die? Oh, God, May 30.” A lawyer present, responding to that, said, “2015.” Biden, replying, said, “Biden: Was it 2015 he had died?”
Moments later, Biden spoke about Trump’s election and said, “Trump gets elected in November of 2017?” He was then corrected, yet again, by the lawyers present. When informed that Trump was elected in 2016, not 2016, he said, “16, 2016, all right, so why do I have 2017 here?” A lawyer present informed him that 2017 is when Trump was inaugurated and the Obama-Biden team cleared out, telling him, “That’s when you left office.”
Biden also fired off other shocking questions about key moments in his recent life during the interview with Hur, such as “When did I announce for President?” and, “Well, if it was 2013 — when did I stop being Vice President?”
The full transcript would appear to confirm Hur’s characterization of Biden in his report. At one point in that report, for instance, special counsel Hur said, “We have also considered that, at trial, Mr. Biden would likely present himself to a jury, as he did during our interview of him, as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory . . . It would be difficult to convince a jury that they should convict him—by then a former president well into his eighties of a serious felony that requires a mental state of willfulness.”
Another part of it provided, “In his interview with our office, Mr. Biden’s memory was worse. He did not remember when he was vice president, forgetting on the first day of the interview when his term ended (“if it was 2013 – when did I stop being Vice President?”), and forgetting on the second day of the interview when his term began (“in 2009, am I still Vice President?”), He did not remember, even within several years, when his son Beau died. And his memory appeared hazy when describing the Afghanistan debate that was once so important to him. Among other things, he mistakenly said he “had a real difference” of opinion with General Karl Eikenberry, when, in fact, Eikenberry was an ally whom Mr. Biden cited approvingly in his Thanksgiving memo to President Obama. In a case where the government must prove that Mr. Biden knew he had possession of the classified Afghanistan documents after the vice presidency and chose to keep those documents, knowing he was violating the law, we expect that at trial, his attorneys would emphasize these limitations in his recall.”
Rep. Adam Schiff sounded off on that characterization of the president. Watch him here:
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