A federal judge on Friday rejected former President Joe Biden's attempt to block the Trump administration from releasing to a conservative group the recordings that Biden made with a ghostwriter. U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich found that the public interest in the material outweighed whatever privacy rights Biden had, but she effectively put her ruling on hold for up to three weeks so Biden could appeal.
The recordings were obtained by special counsel Robert Hur in the course of his investigation into whether Biden improperly retained classified documents while a senator and vice president. Republicans in Congress demanded them after Hur declined to file charges against the then-president.
Biden's Democratic administration refused to turn over the recordings and transcripts from 2016 and 2017, leading congressional Republicans to hold his attorney general, Merrick Garland, in contempt.
President Donald Trump's Justice Department authorized the release of the materials. That led Biden last month to sue to seek to block the release to a staffer at the conservative Heritage Foundation who had formally requested the records.
Biden objected to the release as an invasion of privacy, saying the recordings included him discussing sensitive personal matters such as the death of his older son, Beau Biden. But Friedrich found that the administration redacted that material.
The judge wrote that the materials “contain no mention of highly sensitive topics like illness or death, nor do they mention any non-public persons, including members of Biden's family.”
Representatives for Biden did not immediately comment but asked Friedrich to bar release of the material while they appeal her decision. The Justice Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Friedrich was nominated by Trump, a Republican, in 2017.
Hur’s yearlong investigation led to a 345-page report that questioned the effects of Biden’s age and his mental competence but recommended no criminal charges against the then-81-year-old. Hur said he found insufficient evidence to prosecute a case in court successfully.
The transcripts of five hours of Biden interviews with federal prosecutors was released that same year. While Biden was adamant that he treated classified information seriously, the transcript shows that he was at times fuzzy about dates and details and he said he was unfamiliar with the paper trail for some of the sensitive documents he handled.
