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      Biden ‘gets how he’s viewed’, White House spokeswoman says as she downplays president’s misspeaking – live

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      White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre has defended to reporters Joe Biden’s fitness to serve and ability to remember details, after comments from special counsel Robert Hur and instances of the president mixing up the names of world leaders.“This is a president that … has had relationships with world leaders for more than 40 years,” Jean-Pierre said, after Biden yesterday evening mixed up the names of the presidents of Mexico and Egypt. “Has he misspoken, as many of us [have]?”She also said Biden, 81, understands that voters are aware of his advanced age.“He gets it. He gets how he’s viewed. He gets what people see and what’s written about him and what the American people also see. But there are other things to know,” Jean-Pierre said, referring to reports that former Republican House speaker Kevin McCarthy considered the president a sharp negotiator.Democrats and Joe Biden’s administration spent the day downplaying and dismissing concerns about the president’s age raised in a report by special counsel Robert Hur, which found that Biden had willfully retained classified documents – but shouldn’t be charged, in part given that a jury could find him too old and doddering to be culpable. Here’s what happened at a glance:
      White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre has defended Joe Biden’s fitness to serve and ability to remember details. She said: “This is a president that … has had relationships with world leaders for more than 40 years,” after Biden yesterday evening mixed up the names of the presidents of Mexico and Egypt. “Has he misspoken, as many of us [have]?” She added: “He gets it. He gets how he’s viewed. He gets what people see and what’s written about him and what the American people also see. But there are other things to know.”
      Ian Sams, the White House spokesman for investigations, blamed Republicans’ attacks on prosecutors for the special counsel’s report. He noted that Hur’s comments came after months of attacks on the justice department and prosecutors elsewhere by the GOP. He said: “For the past few years, Republicans in Congress and elsewhere have been attacking prosecutors who aren’t doing what Republicans want politically. … That reality creates a ton of pressure.”
      Former Obama adviser Dan Pfeiffer called the report a “partisan hit job.” “I fear – and I hope I am wrong – that unlike most of the marginalia that excites political junkies, the Special Counsel’s descriptions of Biden will break through to the public at large,” wrote Pfeiffer in his newsletter.
      Vice President Kamala Harris weighed in, too, saying the special counsel’s comments were “politically motivated” and blasting Hur’s comments as “gratuitous, inaccurate and inappropriate.”
      The spectacle is playing out in the states, too: Wisconsin Democrats joined in to defend the president, brushing aside concerns about Biden’s memory and instead praising his policy record. “Everyone knows we have two older Americans running for president,” congressman Mark Pocan told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. “The difference is one has accomplished much with that life experience and got things done for the American people.”
      On a call with reporters, immigration advocates warned that the rhetoric coming from Donald Trump and Republicans was putting their communities at risk, writes the Guardian’s Lauren Gambino.“The toxicity that has been injected in this debate is fanning the flames of division and doing that has consequences,” said Clarissa Martinez de Castro, Vice President of the Latino Vote Initiative, UnidosUS. “The consequences of this rhetoric are not an intellectual exercise. They actually have a death toll associated with them.” Vanessa Cárdenas, executive director of America’s Voice, accused Republicans of “mainstreaming the dangerous talk of ‘invasion’ and ‘Great Replacement theory’”, and noted that just days ago federal agents arrested a Tennessee militia man who allegedly planning an attack on border agents over fears that the border was being “invaded”.“They have a very dangerous and divisive narrative that really is inciting people to violence,” she said, adding: “They clearly have not learned a lesson from El Paso, Buffalo and Pittsburgh.”Cárdenas said it was “problematic” that Biden had adopted some of the right’s language around shutting down the border.“When he sort of uses the same language as the GOP, that is extremely divisive and not helpful,” she said.“I do think it’s important for him to say that we have to have a functional system,” she continued. “But it is very worrisome when he starts saying things like, ‘we have to close the border.’ I think that’s hugely damaging. Our hope is that he really forcefully speaks about the contributions of immigrants.”The New York congresswoman Elise Stefanik said in a CNN interview Thursday evening that she “would not have done what Mike Pence did,” on January 6, 2021, implying she would have declined to certify the presidential electoral votes.Stefanik’s comments come as the congresswoman, who has risen as a star in the MAGA wing of the Republican Party, vies to be Donald Trump’s running mate in 2024. She previously declined to commit to certify the 2024 presidential election votes, saying she would do so “if this is a legal and valid election.”Other rightwing Republicans, including Ohio senator JD Vance and Montana congressman Matt Rosendale, have also doubled down on election denialism in recent days. In a video launching his campaign for a seat in the US senate today, Rosendale bragged that he had “voted in support of President Trump’s agenda every single time.”“On January the 6th 2021, I stood with President Trump and voted against the electors,” Rosendale declared.Wisconsin Democratic lawmakers defended Joe Biden in conversations with the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, downplaying concerns about the president’s memory raised in a report by special counsel Robert Hur.Democratic senator Tammy Baldwin instead emphasized Biden’s policy record, saying Biden has “shown time and again that he fights for Wisconsin’s working families and has a strong record of creating good-paying jobs, rebuilding our infrastructure, and lowering prescription drug prices.” Similarly, Democratic congressman Mark Pocan stated that Biden “got things done for the American people,” while Donald Trump “has used hate to try to divide this nation and in a way unseen before.”Hur, who investigated Biden’s handling of classified documents and concluded the president had willfully retained national security information, recommended against bringing charges against the president, saying Biden would come across to a jury as a “well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory”.A Wednesday poll by Marquette University Law School found Trump and Biden in a dead heat in Wisconsin, with each carrying the support of 49% of registered voters.The White House is fighting back against special counsel Robert Hur’s comments that Joe Biden struggled to remember details of his life and career in an interview for his investigation into his possession of classified documents. Kamala Harris accused Hur, who said Biden should not face charges, of being “politically motivated”, while spokesman Ian Sams blamed Republican attacks on the justice department for putting pressure on the special counsel. He also noted that the White House was considering releasing the transcript of Biden’s interview, but has not decided yet.Here’s what else has happened today:
      The contest for the Senate got spicier, when relatively popular Republican Larry Hogan jumped into the contest for deep-blue Maryland’s open seat, and Matt Rosendale filed to unseat Democrat Jon Tester in red state Montana, despite losing to him in 2018.
      John Cornyn, an influential Republican senator, said he would support legislation to fund Israel and Ukraine’s military, even if it does not include strict immigration provisions.
      ‘I’m an elderly man and I know what the hell I’m doing’, Biden told reporters in a surprise speech yesterday evening, after Hur’s report was released.
      White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre has defended to reporters Joe Biden’s fitness to serve and ability to remember details, after comments from special counsel Robert Hur and instances of the president mixing up the names of world leaders.“This is a president that … has had relationships with world leaders for more than 40 years,” Jean-Pierre said, after Biden yesterday evening mixed up the names of the presidents of Mexico and Egypt. “Has he misspoken, as many of us [have]?”She also said Biden, 81, understands that voters are aware of his advanced age.“He gets it. He gets how he’s viewed. He gets what people see and what’s written about him and what the American people also see. But there are other things to know,” Jean-Pierre said, referring to reports that former Republican House speaker Kevin McCarthy considered the president a sharp negotiator.Before he departed the podium, Ian Sams shared an unpublished detail of the report that he indicated supports Joe Biden’s argument that he was distracted when he spoke to the special counsel Robert Hur.“What’s interesting about this, and this is oddly not in the report … at the beginning of his interview, the special counsel told the president: ‘I understand that you’re dealing with a lot of things right now, and I’m going to be asking you questions about stuff from a long time ago. I want you to try to recall to the best of your abilities.’ You know, things of that nature,” Sams said.“That’s often what prosecutors would tell witnesses. So, you know, he understood that but the president was going to commit to being cooperative. He talked about this last night. He wanted to make sure he had everything he needed, and he didn’t want to throw up roadblocks.”The White House spokesman Ian Sams noted his disagreement with the special counsel Robert Hur’s description’s of Joe Biden’s ability to recall details.“I dispute that the characterizations about his memory in the report are accurate, because they’re not. And I think the president spoke very clearly about how his mind was on other things. I mean, he was dealing with a huge international crisis of great global consequence,” Sams said, referencing Biden’s argument that he was preoccupied with the fallout from Hamas’s 7 October attack on Israel.Sams also described interviews by prosecutors as uniquely intense experiences:
      I think there’s something important that people should remember about the way that, sort of, interviews like this happen. God forbid, you know, one of you guys ever have to get interviewed by a prosecutor … Witnesses are told, as I mentioned, by special counsel to do the best they can to recall or remember things, and they’re not supposed to speculate. They want facts. They want facts and evidence. And so, you know, I think probably in almost every prosecutorial interview, you can imagine that people have said that they don’t recall things because that’s what they’re instructed to do. So I think that’s just important context.
      Joe Biden plans to appoint a taskforce to review how classified documents are handled during transitions between presidential administrations, White House spokesman Ian Sams said.The subtext here is that Biden was not alone in possessing classified materials that he should not have. Mike Pence, a fellow former vice-president, also left the White House with government secrets, and was cleared of potential charges last year.Donald Trump is, of course, facing criminal charges for not only taking classified documents but also hiding them from investigators.Here’s what Sams had to say about what this new taskforce will do:
      We had the issue with President Biden. Immediately after that, we had the issue with Vice-President Pence. And I think it’s important to understand that this is a common occurrence, and the president thinks that we should fix it. Like, he gave all these documents back, he knew … that the government should be in possession of these documents.
      And so, what we’re going to do is the president’s gonna appoint a taskforce to review how transitions look at classified material to ensure that there are better processes in place so that when, you know, staffs around the building are roughly packing up boxes to try to get out during a transition as quickly as possible, at the same time … they’re still governing and doing matters of state. They’re going to try to make recommendations that that can be fixed, and he’s going to appoint a senior government leader to do that. We’ll have more on that soon.
      White House spokesman Ian Sams also indicated that it’s possible transcripts of Joe Biden’s interviews with special counsel Robert Hur’s team could be released.The transcripts could shine some light on some of the more jarring comments about the president’s memory Hur made in his report, such as that he could not recall the years he was vice-president, or when his son, Beau Biden, died.“I don’t have any announcement on, you know, releasing anything today, but it’s a reasonable question and there are classified stuff and we’ll have to work through,” Sams said, when asked about the possibility of the transcripts’ release.“We’ll take a look at that and make a determination,” he replied, when a reporter pressed him further.Ian Sams, the White House spokesman for investigations, noted that Republican special counsel Robert Hur’s comments about Joe Biden’s memory and age came after months of attacks on the justice department and prosecutors elsewhere by the GOP:
      We also need to talk about the environment that we are in. For the past few years, Republicans in Congress and elsewhere have been attacking prosecutors who aren’t doing what Republicans want politically. They have made up claims of a two-tiered system of justice between Republicans and Democrats. They have denigrated the rule of law for political purposes. That reality creates a ton of pressure and in that pressurized political environment, when the inevitable conclusion is that the facts and the evidence don’t support any charges, you’re left to wonder why this report spends time making gratuitous and inappropriate criticisms of the president.
      The White House press briefing has started, and spokesman Ian Sams is at the podium.He is reiterated that special counsel Robert Hur cleared Joe Biden of wrongdoing, and underscored that the president cooperated with his investigation. Thus far, Sams has refrained from condemning Hur’s conduct, as Kamala Harris and others have done.The Biden administration’s counterattack to special counsel Robert Hur’s comments about the president’s age and memory will continue in a few minutes, when the White House press briefing begins.Press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre will be joined by Ian Sams, the White House spokesman who handles investigations of the president.We’ll cover what he has to say, and what reporters have to say to him, live here.Kamala Harris has condemned special counsel Robert Hur’s comments about Joe Biden’s age and memory as “gratuitous, inaccurate and inappropriate”, and noted that the president’s interview was conducted in the “intense” aftermath of the 7 October terrorist attack in Israel.The vice-president’s comments were a strong denunciation of the language used by Hur, a Republican former US attorney appointed by attorney general Merrick Garland to investigate the discovery of classified documents at Biden’s personal residences. Hur determined no charges were warranted, but repeatedly noted that Biden could not remember aspects of his life and career in their interview.Here are Harris’s full remarks:Pennsylvania’s Democratic senator John Fetterman said he believes Joe Biden is still up to the job as president, and criticized comments about his memory made by special counsel Robert Hur.“The president was very clear in that he is absolutely in full control,” Fetterman said, before turning to Hur’s lengthy report into the classified documents found in Biden’s possession that noted he could not remember some details of his life and career.“That’s 350 pages to just say that Joe Biden isn’t going to be indicted here. It was just a smear job and cheap shots and just taking things out of context, or even just inventing any of them too,” Fetterman said.There have been a couple of interesting developments today in the contest to determine whether Democrats can maintain their slim hold on the Senate in November’s election.Popular former Republican governor Larry Hogan jumped into the race for Maryland’s open seat. While his election would be an upset in a state Joe Biden won with 65% of the vote in 2020, Hogan has proven his ability to win statewide elections in Maryland before, and his candidacy will probably force Democrats to spend money there that they otherwise could have used elsewhere. Here are some thoughts on Hogan’s candidacy, from University of Virginia analyst Kyle Kondik:Democrats received slightly better news in Montana, a red state where the party is fighting to get senator Jon Tester elected again. Republican congressman Matt Rosendale today made his much-expected bid for Congress’s upper chamber official – but the GOP isn’t particularly happy about it, since Tester beat Rosendale in 2018.Steve Daines, Montana’s junior senator and the head of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, had this to say about Rosendale’s entry:
      It’s unfortunate that rather than building seniority for our great state in the House, Matt is choosing to abandon his seat and create a divisive primary. Tim Sheehy has my full support because he is the best candidate to take on Jon Tester. Whichever party wins the Montana Senate seat will control the United States Senate in 2024, and Republicans cannot risk nominating a candidate who gave Jon Tester the biggest victory of his career. More

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      Democrats work on damage control after Biden’s fiery surprise speech

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      Democrats and their allies were shaping a damage control response on Friday to a hastily organized White House press call the night before that appeared to fall short in its mission to reassure voters about Joe Biden’s mental acuity after it was harshly questioned in a prosecutor’s report about his having kept classified documents at the end of his vice-presidency.Biden already said that his interview with the special counsel Robert Hur last October – in which he was reported to have forgotten the year his son Beau died and precisely when he had been vice-president – came in the days straight after Hamas attacked southern Israel, when Biden was preoccupied with the US response.Hur’s report concluded on Thursday that Biden would not face criminal charges in the case, despite “willfully” retaining and disclosing classified material, which he would not be open to as a sitting president anyway but also would not be warranted even if he was no longer president.But Hur then went on to describe at length how he found the US president’s memory to be failing, prompting anger from Biden and, in the following hours and into Friday, Democrats and aides to come to his defense.“The way that the president’s demeanor in that report was characterized could not be more wrong on the facts and clearly politically motivated,” Kamala Harris told MSNBC on Friday.The vice-president slammed claims of Biden’s failing mental acuity made in the 388-pages report as “gratuitous, inaccurate and inappropriate”.Earlier, Democratic Senator Tammy Baldwin from the crucial swing state of Wisconsin addressed the conclusions by special counsel Robert Hur that the 81-year-old president’s recall was “significantly limited”, and that Hur would not bring charges over classified documents in part because jurors would see the US president not as a willful criminal but as a “well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory”.“I judge a president on what they’ve done and whose side they’re on,” Baldwin told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. She pointed to Biden’s “strong record of creating good-paying jobs, rebuilding our infrastructure, and lowering prescription drug prices”.Tommy Vietor, a former Obama administration staffer, wrote on X that the prosecutor’s comments were “just a rightwing hit job from within Biden’s own DOJ. Wild.”On MSNBC, which often previews the Democratic party line, the host Joe Scarborough addressed the conclusions by the special counsel that the president’s recall was “significantly limited” and he would not bring charges over classified documents in part because jurors would see Biden as a “well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory”, not a criminal.“So bizarre,” Scarborough said. “Why in the world would [Hur] put his neurological assessment of Joe Biden in his report, and why would [US attorney general] Merrick Garland release garbage like that in a justice department report?”Dan Goldman, the Democratic congressman from New York, told the station that he did not have “any concerns” about Biden’s age or ability. “Remember, the job of the president is to guide our country. It is not to be a cheerleader for the United States. It is to govern our country,” he said.Referring to missing Hillary Clinton emails that became an issue on the eve of the 2016 election, Scarborough added: “It sure sounds like James Comey in 2016 when he couldn’t indict Hillary Clinton legally so he indicted her politically.”Vietor echoed that line, claiming Hur had “clearly decided to go down the Jim Comey path of filling his report absolving Biden of criminal activity with ad hominem attacks”.The long-shot Democratic primary challenger Dean Phillips, who is campaigning against Biden, said Hur’s report had “all but handed the 2024 election to Donald Trump”.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotion“The report simply affirms what most Americans already know, that the President cannot continue to serve as our Commander-in-Chief beyond his term ending January 20, 2025,” Phillips said in a statement.Behind closed doors, some Democrats expressed mounting concerns about a re-election narrative that focuses on Biden’s age. “It’s a nightmare,” a Democratic House member reportedly told NBC News. “It weakens President Biden electorally, and Donald Trump would be a disaster and an authoritarian.”“For Democrats, we’re in a grim situation,” the anonymous source reportedly added.Biden hit back at Hur’s characterization of his mental condition during a surprise press conference at the White House on Thursday evening. The president maintained that his memory was “just fine” and in a tense exchange said “I know what the hell I’m doing” and that remarks about his memory had “no place in this report”.“My memory is fine,” Biden said. “Take a look at what I’ve done since I’ve become president.”“For any extraneous commentary, they don’t know what they’re talking about,” he added. “It has no place in this report.”At the end of the interview, he referred to Egypt’s president, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, as the “president of Mexico” in a response to a reporter’s query about the current situation in the Middle East. The error came after two other public gaffes this week in which Biden claimed to have spoken recently with two long-dead European leaders, Germany’s Helmut Kohl and France’s François Mitterrand.Polling has consistently shown that concerns about Biden’s age are seen as his greatest political liability in a rematch with Donald Trump.A poll by NBC News last month found that 76% of voters had major or moderate concerns when asked whether Biden has “the necessary mental and physical health to be president for a second term”. Asked the same question about the 77-year-old Trump, 48% said they had major or moderate concerns. More

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      in US Politics

      Who tanked the border bill? – podcast

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      Illegal immigration via the US-Mexico border remains one of the most pressing problems for Congress. And yet the much anticipated $118bn border security bill, which included aid packages to Ukraine and Israel, was blocked by senators after a chaotic week.
      Why did this crucial piece of legislation with bipartisan support get rejected by the very people who demanded it? This week, Joan E Greve is joined by Marianna Sotomayor, the congressional reporter for the Washington Post, to discuss why the border bill failed

      How to listen to podcasts: everything you need to know More

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      Biden was in a fighting mood for surprise speech – but he didn’t win

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      It came out of the blue. The White House announced that Joe Biden would deliver remarks at 7.45pm – giving the press just 23 minutes to prepare. What the sudden speech would be about, no one knew. The element of surprise and uncertainty was reminiscent of the Donald Trump era.As it happened, many White House correspondents were at a meeting near the Watergate building about a mile and a half way. The Guardian was among four who jumped in a car, raced across town and sprinted up sedate Pennsylvania Avenue, greeting the Secret Service in a breathless and disheveled state.Perhaps the press were about to witness history. Was Biden set to announce peace in the Middle East or Ukraine? Was this his Bin Laden moment, a military strike that killed a top terrorist leader? Or after a devastating justice department report said his memory is shot due to old age, was he about to do a Lyndon B Johnson and announce he is not seeking re-election?Reporters and TV and radio crews gathered in the Diplomatic Reception Room, the site of Franklin Roosevelt’s radio addresses known as “fireside chats”. Above the fireplace was a portrait of George Washington and thick hardback books bearing the names of recent past presidents. The posh, old-fashioned room comes with panoramic French wallpaper showing vistas of America.After all the hush and hype, Biden emerged at the lectern and did not resign. Far from it; he was in a fighting mood. Biden was responding to the special counsel’s report, welcoming its conclusion that no charges should be brought against him for mishandling classified information. But the president was also combative, emotional and then – not for the first time – took one question too many and paid the price.Special counsel Robert Hur had described the 81-year-old Democrat’s memory as “hazy”, “fuzzy”, “faulty”, “poor” and having “significant limitations”. Biden commented: “There’s even a reference that I don’t remember” – he paused for a moment and swallowed, as if the words are still hard to say – “when my son died”.Beau Biden died of cancer in 2015. With barely concealed anger, the president continued: “How in the hell dare he raise that? Frankly, when I was asked the question, I thought to myself, it wasn’t any of their damn business. Some of you have commented. I wear since the day he died every single day, the rosary he got from Our Lady of … ”He reached to show the rosary and appeared to be choking up. “Every Memorial Day we hold a service remembering him, attended by friends and family and the people who loved him. I don’t need anyone, I don’t need anyone to remind me when he passed away.”Tall, blond and loud, Peter Doocy of the conservative Fox News network, which is pushing the geriatric case against Biden hard, noted that the special counsel called Biden a “well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory”. The president parried: “I’m well-meaning and I’m an elderly man and I know what the hell I’m doing. I’ve been president and I put this country back on its feet.”Doocy pressed: “How bad is your memory and can you continue as president?”Biden: “My memory is so bad I let you speak.”Touché.Another reporter weighed in: “Do you think your memory has gotten worse, Mr President?”Biden answered: “My memory is fine. Take a look at what I’ve done since I’ve become president. None of you thought I could pass any of the things I got passed. How did that happen? I guess I just forgot what was going on.”skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionBut soon things started to go off the rails a bit. From a raucous cacophony of reporters’ voices, one emerged to ask: “Mr President, for months when you were asked about your age, you would respond with the words ‘watch me’. Well, many American people have been watching and they have expressed concerns about your age.”Biden looked cross again. “That is your judgment!” he said, his voice rising as he pointed an accusing finger. “That is your judgment. That is not the judgment of the press” – presumably he meant to say public.Biden went on to insist: “I’m the most qualified person in this country to be president of the United States and finish the job I started.”More questions. More frenetic noise. More grumpy expressions and finger pointing from Biden. “I did not share classified information!” he almost shouted. “Let me answer your question!”Still, he rounded off with a flourish: “I did not break the law. Period,” and started making his way to the exit. The Biden comms team must have been breathing a huge sigh of relief. A fiery riposte to the critics! No major gaffes! Then imagine their dismay (“Keep walking, don’t turn around, oh my god, he’s going back”) as Biden halted, turned and returned to the lectern, unable to resist a question about hostage negotiations in Gaza.It was then that, having protested his memory is all good and his age is not an issue, that Biden put his foot in it again, mistakenly referring to Egypt’s leader Abdel Fatah al-Sisi as “the president of Mexico”. This followed his assertions that in recent days he met François Mitterrand of France and Helmut Kohl of Germany when both were already dead.Doocy and Fox News had their story after all. Minutes later, the network was running the chyron: “Biden confuses the presidents of Egypt and Mexico.” It followed up with: “Biden raises even more questions about cognitive health after disastrous press conference.”And it’s still only February. More

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      in Elections

      Biden defends record as special counsel files no charges in handling of classified material – video

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      President Joe Biden welcomed the finding of a special counsel report that he would not face criminal charges in his handling of classified documents. Biden said he was ‘pleased’ the special counsel had ‘reached the conclusion I believed and knew all along they would’. The US Department of Justice special counsel investigating Biden’s handling of classified documents after his vice-presidency released a report concluding that he ‘willfully’ kept and shared classified information including ‘classified documents about military and foreign policy in Afghanistan’ and handwritten notes about national security and foreign policy ‘implicating sensitive intelligence sources and methods’. More

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      Special counsel delivers Trump a Biden attack line on a silver platter

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      The president is not a crook. But there may be something more unforgivable in the court of public opinion. The president is old.That is what will linger from Joe Biden’s pyrrhic victory at the hands of the justice department on Thursday. True, he will not face criminal charges over his handling of highly classified documents when a private citizen, despite an awkward photo revealing papers stashed in a broken cardboard box in his garage, according to special counsel Robert Hur.But most striking among the reasons that Hur gave for his decision was that 81-year-old 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”.The special counsel had delivered an attack line to Donald Trump’s election campaign on a silver platter. Only in America could Trump gain a political lift from 91 criminal charges even as his opponent suffers a political setback from not being charged at all.And Trump, who is 77, is at least as likely to speak gobbledygook as Biden, recently confusing his Republican opponent Nikki Haley with former House speaker Nancy Pelosi. Yet as in so many other areas, he is somehow given a free ride, in part because he is a white hot ball of anger who just seems younger, in part because his age seems trivial compared to his alleged crimes and misdemeanours, including a far more serious classified documents case.But Hur still wrote that Biden’s memory was “significantly limited” when he was interviewed by members of his prosecution team. It “appeared hazy” regarding the debate about US forces in Afghanistan and could not recall the years when he was vice-president. Most startlingly, Biden “did not remember, even within several years, when his son Beau died”.It is all fodder for Republicans, who have been working around the clock to pin Biden to the wall as a babbling Methuselah who doesn’t know what day of the week it is. Alex Pfeiffer, communications director for Make America Great Again Inc, a pro-Trump Super Pac, said: “If you’re too senile to stand trial, then you’re too senile to be president. Joe Biden is unfit to lead this nation.”Nikki Haley, a Republican candidate for president, posted on social media: “Joe Biden can’t remember major events in his life, like when he was vice-president or when his son died. That is sad, but it will be even sadder if we have a person in the White House who is not mentally up to the most important job in the world.”Biden’s lawyers were quick to dismiss the report as a hatchet job by a partisan hack swerving outside his lane. They accused of Hur, a Republican who served in senior roles at the justice department during the Trump administration, of overreach and “investigative excess”.Unfortunately that defence had already been undercut by Biden himself. Speaking in Nevada on Sunday, he apparently confused François Mitterrand, the former French president who died in 1996, with France’s current president, Emmanuel Macron, while recalling European worries over US democracy and the January 6 insurrection.Then, in New York on Wednesday, Biden referred to former German chancellor Helmut Kohl – who died in 2017 – as talking to him about the same issue when he apparently meant Angela Merkel.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionA day later the White House press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, tried to neutralise the gaffes by pointing to recent examples of other public figures – including the House speaker, Mike Johnson, and Fox News host Sean Hannity – mixing up names. She told reporters: “And, look – you know, look, as it relates to the names and – and what he was trying to – you know, what he was trying to – to say, look, many people – elected officials, many people – you know, they tend – they can – they can mis- – misspeak sometimes. Right?”Biden, meanwhile, is not helping his own case. He turned down the chance to do a TV interview before Sunday’s American football Super Bowl, a platform that reaches millions of viewers who might not be following politics closely. He has sat for a quarter as many interviews as Trump at this point in his presidency, and one-fifth as many as Obama, according to the White House Transition Project’s Martha Kumar.Such elusiveness gives the impression of a man whose “handlers” believe that he must be coddled and shielded for his own health and gaffe avoidance.There are eerie echoes of 2016 when then FBI director James Comey declined to recommend charges against Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton over her use of a personal email system when she was secretary of state but rebuked her as “extremely careless”. Comey reopened his investigation 11 days before the election; Clinton has blamed him for her shocking loss to Trump.What those Comey interventions did was feed a pre-existing narrative that Clinton, wife of former president Bill Clinton, came with a whiff of corruption, an elitist assumption that the rules governing everyone else did not apply to her. Now special counsel Hur has fed a pre-existing narrative that Biden is too old for the job. Should that solidify in the public mind as his defining characteristic, it will be a disaster for the president’s re-election – and the battle to preserve democracy. More

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      in US Politics

      Biden described as ‘elder man with poor memory’ in damning classified document report – live

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      Special counsel Robert Hur wrote that he was concerned jurors would not believe that Joe Biden “willfully” kept classified documents, and that was one of the reasons why he does not think the president should face charges.“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,” Hur writes.“Based on our direct interactions with and observations of him, he is someone for whom many jurors will want to identify reasonable doubt. 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.”Hur wrote that: “Mr. Biden’s memory was significantly limited, both during his recorded interviews with the ghostwriter in 2017, and in his interview with our office in 2023. And his cooperation with our investigation, including by reporting to the government that the Afghanistan documents were in his Delaware garage, will likely convince some jurors that he made an innocent mistake, rather than acting willfully – that is, with intent to break the law – as the statute requires.”In addition to the statement from Donald Trump himself, Make America Great Again Inc. – a super PAC supporting the former president’s campaign for election in 2024, has released its own comment on Hur’s report.“If you’re too senile to stand trial, then you’re too senile to be president,” said Alex Pfeiffer, communications director for Make America Great Again Inc. “Joe Biden is unfit to lead this nation.”Former president Donald Trump has released a statement via his campaign regarding the findings in the report from Robert Hur, saying “THIS HAS NOW PROVEN TO BE A TWO-TIERED SYSTEM OF JUSTICE AND UNCONSTITUTIONAL SELECTIVE PROSECUTION!” [sic].Trump referenced his own classified documents case, in which he is charged of willful retention of national defense information, false statements and representations, conspiracy to obstruct justice, withholding a document or record, corruptly concealing a document, concealing a document in a federal investigation and a scheme to conceal. That case is expected to go to trial in May 2024.
      The Biden Documents Case is 100 times different and more severe than mine. I did nothing wrong, and I cooperated far more. What Biden did is outrageously criminal – He had 50 years of documents, 50 times more than I had, and “WILLFULLY RETAINED” them. I was covered by the Presidential Records Act, Secret Service was always around, and GSA delivered the documents. Deranged Jack Smith should drop this Case immediately. ELECTION INTERFERENCE.
      Republican chairman James Comer of the House committee on oversight and accountability has issued the following statement on the report from special counsel Robert Hur:
      Americans expect equal justice under the law and are dismayed the Justice Department continues to allow Joe Biden to live above it. Joe Biden willfully retained classified documents for years in unsecure locations and intentionally disclosed them yet faces no consequences for his actions. The House Oversight Committee has been investigating Joe Biden’s mishandling of classified documents and we have uncovered key facts that unravel the White House’s and President Biden’s personal attorney’s narrative of events. Additionally, important questions remain about the extent of Joe Biden retaining sensitive materials related to specific countries involving his family’s influence peddling schemes that brought in millions for the Bidens. While the Justice Department has closed its investigation, the Oversight Committee’s investigation continues. We will continue to provide the transparency and accountability owed to the American people.
      In addition to the statement, Comer said the White House was not cooperating with interviews the committee has requested with current and former White House staff who were involved with organizing, moving and removing boxes that contained classified materials.He stated that the report confirmed Biden retained documents related to China and Ukraine, “two countries the Bidens have solicited and received millions of dollars from”.You can read special counsel Robert Hur’s report into Joe Biden’s possession of classified documents, as well as the rebuttal from the president’s attorneys, below:Attorneys for Joe Biden objected to special counsel Robert Hur repeatedly mentioning the president’s memory problems in his report.Referring to his conversation with Mark Zwonitzer, ghostwriter of his 2017 memoir Promise Me, Dad, Hur writes: “Mr. Biden’s recorded conversations with Zwonitzer from 2017 are often painfully slow, with Mr. Biden struggling to remember events and straining at times to read and relay his own notebook entries.”He later goes on to describe Biden as showing “diminished faculties and faulty memory” in his conversations with Zwonitzer.In a letter written to Hur dated earlier this week and included in the report, the president’s special counsel Richard Sauber and personal attorney Bob Bauer took issue with the special counsel’s language:
      We do not believe that the report’s treatment of President Biden’s memory is accurate or appropriate. The report uses highly prejudicial language to describe a commonplace occurrence among witnesses: a lack of recall of years-old events. Such comments have no place in a Department of Justice report, particularly one that in the first paragraph announces that no criminal charges are ‘warranted’ and that ‘the evidence does not establish Mr. Biden’s guilt.’
      They continue:
      Not only do you treat the President differently from other witnesses when discussing his limited recall of certain years-ago events, but you also do so on occasions in prejudicial and inflammatory terms. You refer to President Biden’s memory on at least nine occasions – a number that is itself gratuitous.
      Sauber and Bauer requested Hur “revisit your descriptions of President Biden’s memory”. He apparently did not do so.Special counsel Robert Hur included in his report photos of where Joe Biden’s classified documents were stored:In a just-released statement, Joe Biden said he “threw up no roadblocks” to Robert Hur’s investigation of his possession of classified documents, and notes he spoke to the special counsel even in the aftermath of Hamas’s 7 October attack on Israel.The president’s comments came after Hur’s report noted that it would be difficult to convince jurors the “elderly” Biden intentionally kept government secrets, and related his inability to remember important dates during interviews with the special counsel.Here’s what Biden had to say, in full:
      The Special Counsel released today its findings about its look into my handling of classified documents. I was pleased to see they reached the conclusion I believed all along they would reach – that there would be no charges brought in this case and the matter is now closed.This was an exhaustive investigation going back more than 40 years, even into the 1970s when I was a young Senator. I cooperated completely, threw up no roadblocks, and sought no delays. In fact, I was so determined to give the Special Counsel what they needed that I went forward with five hours of in-person interviews over two days on October 8th and 9th of last year, even though Israel had just been attacked on October 7th and I was in the middle of handling an international crisis. I just believed that’s what I owed the American people so they could know no charges would be brought and the matter closed.Over my career in public service, I have always worked to protect America’s security. I take these issues seriously and no one has ever questioned that.
      Special counsel Robert Hur wrote that in an interview last year, Joe Biden struggled to recall key chapters in his personal and professional life:
      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. Eiden cited approvingly in his Thanksgiving memo to President Obama.
      Biden’s lack of ability to remember things would make it hard to prosecute him, Hur said:
      We also expect many jurors to be struck by the place where the Afghanistan documents were ultimately found in Mr. Biden’s Delaware home: in a badly damaged box in the garage, near a collapsed dog crate, a dog bed, a Zappos box, an empty bucket, a broken lamp wrapped with duct tape, potting soil, and synthetic firewood.
      A reasonable juror could conclude that this is not where a person intentionally stores what he supposedly considers to be important classified documents, critical to his legacy. Rather, it looks more like a place a person stores classified documents he has forgotten about or is unaware of. We have considered – and investigated – the possibility that the box was intentionally placed in the garage to make it appear to be there by mistake, but the evidence does not support that conclusion.
      Special counsel Robert Hur wrote that he was concerned jurors would not believe that Joe Biden “willfully” kept classified documents, and that was one of the reasons why he does not think the president should face charges.“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,” Hur writes.“Based on our direct interactions with and observations of him, he is someone for whom many jurors will want to identify reasonable doubt. 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.”Hur wrote that: “Mr. Biden’s memory was significantly limited, both during his recorded interviews with the ghostwriter in 2017, and in his interview with our office in 2023. And his cooperation with our investigation, including by reporting to the government that the Afghanistan documents were in his Delaware garage, will likely convince some jurors that he made an innocent mistake, rather than acting willfully – that is, with intent to break the law – as the statute requires.”In his report, special counsel Robert Hur outlines how Joe Biden “willfully” disclosed classified documents, but says the available evidence does not establish the president’s guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.“Our investigation uncovered evidence that President Biden willfully retained and disclosed classified materials after his vice presidency when he was a private citizen,” Hur wrote in the report’s executive summary. “These materials included (1) marked classified documents about military and foreign policy in Afghanistan, and (2) notebooks containing Mr. Biden’s handwritten entries about issues of national security and foreign policy implicating sensitive intelligence sources and methods. FBI agents recovered these materials from the garage, offices, and basement den in Mr. Biden’s Wilmington, Delaware home.”Justice department policy prohibits bringing charges against a president while they are in office, but Hur notes that, even if that were not the case, he would not recommend charging Biden.The special counsel then goes in to why he does not think jurors would convict Biden. The reasons include evidence suggests Biden simply forgot he had classified material, or that jurors believed that when he found it, he would not have realized he was breaking the law, because the former vice-president was so used to seeing such documents.The White House was provided a copy of special counsel Robert Hur’s report into Joe Biden’s possession of classified documents, and reviewed it to determine if it revealed privileged information.Ian Sams, a spokesman for the White House counsel, said no changes were made: “We notified the justice department at approximately 9.00 this morning that our privilege review has concluded. In keeping with his commitment to cooperation and transparency throughout this investigation, the president declined to assert privilege over any portion of the report.”There will be no criminal charges filed in the classified documents investigation involving Joe Biden, Reuters is reporting, citing MSNBC, which is attributing that to an unnamed law enforcement official.More details soon.Meanwhile, Trump and Biden’s classified documents cases (in which the former president has been criminally charged and the current president has not) have similarities, there are also some notable differences.The White House said Biden’s attorneys found a small number of classified documents and turned them over after discovery.Trump resisted handing over boxes of classified material until a 2022 FBI search turned up about 100 classified documents, leading to obstruction of justice charges against Trump and two employees at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida.The White House said Biden and his team have cooperated with special counsel Robert Hur and his investigators. Biden cannot face federal criminal charges as a sitting president under a longstanding justice department policy.The findings could pose political headaches for Biden who has sought to draw a contrast with Trump on issues of personal ethics and national security.Hur’s report, and his decision not to bring criminal charges, are likely to fuel accusations of a double standard from Trump and his Republican allies.[But] Trump was charged after prosecutors said he refused for months to turn over boxes containing presidential records he had taken to Mar-a-Lago and took steps to conceal the documents after the US government demanded their return. Trump has pleaded not guilty and a trial is scheduled for May but is likely to be delayed.The special counsel in the Biden classified documents investigation focused on documents related to Biden’s service as vice-president in the Obama administration from 2009-2017 and from his prior tenure in the US Senate, Reuters reports.Members of Joe Biden’s legal team found classified papers at the office of his Washington thinktank and the US president’s personal residence in Wilmington, Delaware.Biden’s lead rival in the November election, former president Donald Trump, faces a 40-count federal indictment for retaining highly sensitive national security documents at his Florida resort after leaving office in 2021 and obstructing US government efforts to retrieve them.The US Congress has been handed the special counsel report on Joe Biden’s handling of classified documents dating to his years as vice-president to Barack Obama, Reuters is reporting, citing an unnamed source familiar with the matter.The US president was interviewed by special counsel Robert Hur last October and the case relates to actions taken before Biden took the White House.Earlier last year US attorney general Merrick Garland appointed Hur to investigate Biden’s retention of classified documents from his time as vice-president.At the time, lawyers for Biden reported having found classified documents at his home and former thinktank.One day after he strengthened regulations on soot pollution, EPA Administrator Michael Regan spoke about pollution controls’ impact on children at an environmental advocacy event in Washington DC.“This is deeply personal for me,” he said. “Every morning when I leave the house I’m kissing my ten year old son on the forehead and hoping to be the best dad and the best administrator that I can.”Regan described Thursday’s new soot rule as a “gamechanger,” especially for young people, whose developing bodies are more vulnerable to the health effects of pollution – and who face various other hardships.“This is one thing we’re taking off their plates,” he said.Regan spoke at a meeting held by national environmental advocacy group Moms Clean Air Force on Thursday at the National Press Club.Brenda Mallory, chair of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, spoke earlier in the day about the Biden administration’s attempts to “infuse principles of justice and equity into everything.”She touted one Biden administration program which allots 40% of certain environmental federal investments to communities most affected by the climate crisis and pollution.Former first daughter Chelsea Clinton also spoke about environmental pollution at the event at the National Press Club.“We know that in our warming climate, the dangers are particularly acute for our youngest,” she said.Clinton spoke the children-focused efforts she is helming at the Clinton Foundation, of which she is vice-chair. One project: partnering with advocates working to keep schools open year-round, since they serve as not only educational facilities but also as cooling centers in many communities.The Thursday event convened youth advocates, doctors, environmentalists, and public health advocates who called on Americans to work together to push for better regulations on air pollution.“Your voice does matter,” said Nsedu Obot Witherspoon, who directs the Children’s Environmental Health Network. “A lot can really happen when mothers, parents, teachers, come together”Moms Clean Air Force, an national environmental advocacy group, held a summit at the National Press Club on Thursday, featuring guests including Chelsea Clinton and Environmental Protection Agency administrator Michael Regan.Founded in 2011, the organization works to strengthen protections from planet-heating and toxic pollution. It is made up of 1.5 million members, many of whom are mothers.The event comes amid increasing public concern about the climate crisis and pollution, and before a presidential election that will prove crucial for environmental policy in the US.The Biden administration is currently rushing to finalize key environmental protections, including tightened standards on emissions from power plants and vehicles’ tailpipes.“We have enormous challenges in front of us,” said Dominique Browning, co-founder and director of Moms Clean Air Force.“We have never felt greater urgency to get things done.”Paul Billings, who is national senior vice president of public policy at the American Lung Association and was a panelist at Thursday’s event, said that in recent decades, political polarization has proved a major challenge in passing environmental protections. It should not be, he said, because “everyone has lungs.”Panelists also discussed the ways children are disproportionately harmed by pollution and global warming, because their smaller, developing bodies are more vulnerable to health risks.Another major challenge: the rise of mental health issues tied to concern about the climate crisis.“We’re seeing more and more children who are presenting with climate anxiety,” Dr Lisa Patel, executive director of the Medical Society Consortium on Climate and Health and pediatric hospitalist, said.After about two hours of arguments, the supreme court’s nine justices seemed broadly skeptical of the effort to keep Donald Trump from the presidential ballot over his involvement in the January 6 insurrection. It is unclear when they will issue a ruling. Across the street at the Capitol, the Senate advanced a measure providing assistance to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, following a botched attempt to also include hardline immigration policy changes Republicans demanded, then decided they did not like. The GOP wants to make amendments to the legislation, and it’s unclear what its reception will be in the House, but progress on this long-running negotiation appears to finally be happening.Here’s a recap of the day’s events thus far:
      Trump listened in to the supreme courts arguments, which, to his ears, sounded “beautiful”.
      Jason Murray, an attorney for the people challenging Trump’s eligibility, warned the supreme court that the question could “could come back with a vengeance” if he is allowed to run.
      Law professor Derek Muller of the University of Notre Dame predicted the high court would rule quickly.
      The Senate’s vote to advance a bill that will provide assistance to three countries Washington considers national security priorities is a sign of progress in what has been a tortuous and chaotic process.Democrats have wanted for months to approve aid to the three countries, but the GOP, which controls the House and can block passage of legislation in the Senate using the filibuster, demanded they also agree to hardline immigration policy changes. But when those changes were announced earlier this week after months of bipartisan negotiation, Republicans decided they did not like them either, and Republican House speaker Mike Johnson said a bill pairing the border security changes with foreign aid money would not get a vote in his chamber.Yesterday, the Senate voted down that version of the legislation after Republicans and some Democrats objected. The Democratic majority leader Chuck Schumer immediately moved to put up for a vote the legislation that funds only Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan, without addressing immigration policy at all. The Senate just a few minutes ago voted to advance that legislation.But the story is far from over. It’s unclear if the House will approve the legislation, and Schumer said Senate Republicans want to make amendments before final passage:
      We hope to reach an agreement with our Republican colleagues on amendments. Democrats have always been clear that we support having a fair and reasonable amendment process. During my time as majority leader, I have presided over more amendment votes than the Senate held in all four years of the previous administration. For the information of senators, we are going to keep working on this bill until the job is done. More

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      US Senate advances wartime aid package for Ukraine and Israel

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      The Senate on Thursday advanced a wartime aid package for Ukraine and Israel, reviving an effort that had stalled amid Republican opposition to a border security bill they demanded and later abandoned.A day after blocking a measure that would have paired harsh new border restrictions with security assistance for Ukraine, Israel and other US allies, the Senate voted 67 to 32 to begin consideration of the $95bn emergency aid bill. Several Republicans who voted to block the broader border package agreed to open debate on the foreign policy-only version of the measure after securing the opportunity to propose changes, including the immigration enforcement measures that were stripped out.With Kyiv begging Washington for help battling Russian forces on the frontline, the Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, hailed the preliminary vote as a “good first step”. But its prospects remained unclear as Republicans threatened to force a lengthy amendment process.“Failure to pass this bill would only embolden autocrats like [Russia’s Vladimir] Putin and [China’s] Xi [Jinping], who want nothing more than America’s decline,” Schumer said following the vote. He added: “We are going to keep working on this bill until the job is done.”If the Senate passes the bill it would face further uncertainty in the House, where Republicans hold a slim majority and have been increasingly opposed to sending aid to Ukraine.The new foreign aid package under consideration would include billions of dollars in military assistance for Ukraine and security assistance for Israel with humanitarian assistance for civilians in Ukraine, Gaza and the West Bank. However, it would not include the US border security measures outlined in the bipartisan measure, although some Republican senators expressed interest in adding border provisions through an amendment process.Among them was Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican of South Carolina, who voted against advancing the funding measure on Thursday “because I believe we have not done all we can to secure our southern border”.“I enthusiastically support Ukraine, Taiwan and Israel, but as I have been saying for months now, we must protect America first,” the Trump ally said in a statement.The Senate had held an initial vote on the foreign aid package on Wednesday, in which 58 members supported advancing it. That initial motion required only a simple majority for passage, so the bill was able to advance, but 60 votes were needed for advancement on Thursday.There was some apparent uncertainty over how much support the bill had on Wednesday, forcing senators to keep the initial vote on the proposal open for four hours as they debated the best path forward. That evening, Schumer took to the floor to announce that members would reconvene on Thursday to vote on the legislation.“We will recess until tomorrow and give our Republican colleagues the night to figure themselves out,” Schumer said. “We’ll be coming back tomorrow at noon, and hopefully that will give the Republicans the time they need. We will have this vote tomorrow.”Schumer’s comments came hours after the Senate voted 49 to 50 against advancing the bipartisan border bill. Sixty votes were required to start debate on the bill, but 44 Senate Republicans and six of their Democratic colleagues blocked the legislation from moving forward. Just four Senate Republicans – including James Lankford, a Republican of Oklahoma, who helped broker the border deal – supported advancing the bill.Schumer initially supported the bill’s advancement, but he then changed his vote, a procedural maneuver that would allow him to take up the legislation again later. In a floor speech delivered on Wednesday before the vote, Schumer criticized Republicans for opposing the bipartisan bill and accused them of doing Donald Trump’s political bidding. The former president had called on Republicans to oppose the border deal out of concern for how it might affect the presidential race and his campaign’s focus on the issue of immigration.“Donald Trump doesn’t like that the Senate finally reached a bipartisan border deal. So he has demanded Republicans kill it,” Schumer said. “He thinks it’s far better to keep the border in chaos so he can exploit it for personal political gains. And Senate Republicans – vertebrae nowhere to be found – are ready to blunder away our best chance of fixing the border in order to elevate what they see as the interests of Donald Trump above the interests of the country.” More