This is my understanding of the situation so please don’t fully take my word for it.
Garland refused to fully cooperate with a subpoena issued to him by rebublicans. (specifically he refused to hand over audio from an interview of Biden in his classified documents investigation) Garland refused to cooperate because Biden told him not to cooperate. Republicans in congress then voted to find him in contempt of congress and wanted the DOJ to prosecute him. The DOJ then came through saying he didn’t do anything wrong because he just did what Biden told him to do. And being part of biden’s administration it’s only normal to do what the president asks.
If we want to go back even further iirc there was a special council investigation into Biden regarding a handful of documents found at biden’s home from the Obama administration. Biden apologized saying he forgot that he had those docs. He handed those docs over to investigators and fully cooperated with them. That whole situation ended with special investigators finding that Biden didn’t do anything malicious and just forgot to relinquish (I think it was literally 3) those docs when he left office in 2016. That should have been the end of it. Republicans then drudged things up and wanted his interview from that investigation. Presumably to make it look like Biden was guilty of the same crimes trump is guilty of.
Technically speaking though Biden is guilty of violating the presidential records act. The same act trump is/was being tried for in his classified documents case. The difference being that Trump willfully took boxes upon boxes of documents pertaining to our national security secrets to Mar-a-Lago when he left office and then refused to cooperate with the FBI when they called him out for it. This then forced the FBI to raid Mar-a-Lago to get the documents back. Biden on the other hand was just old and forgot about some work he took home. When he was called out about it he fully cooperated and gave the documents back.
Garland refused to cooperate because Biden told him not to cooperate.
It’s a little more complicated than that. The DoJ released the full transcript of all the interviews between the Special Counsel and President Biden. What’s at issue now is that Republicans also want the audio tapes of all those interviews.
The DoJ is pushing back, and saying that Congress has all the info they need already with the full transcript, and they dont need the audio. The only purpose for releasing the audio is to use sound bites in Republican campaign ads.
I actually wish Biden never claimed executive privilege on it, because there is nothing on that tape we don’t know. It’s all in the transcript. Claiming privilege makes it look like there’s secrets in it.
i also wish that the DoJ would have trotted out the 'No Legitimate Legislative Purpose" line that Barr did when he defied his subpoena. Because that is technically correct now: there is nothing to learn that we don’t already know from the transcript.
I mean, I clearly didn’t mean he had a guilty judgment against him and the word guilty doesn’t necessarily always imply legally guilty. But fine. For semantic’s sake, He’s not “guilty”, but he did in fact violate the presidential records act. It was just decided that he wouldn’t be prosecuted because it was a just a small oversight. Which, to be clear, is a decision I agree with.
This is my understanding of the situation so please don’t fully take my word for it.
Garland refused to fully cooperate with a subpoena issued to him by rebublicans. (specifically he refused to hand over audio from an interview of Biden in his classified documents investigation) Garland refused to cooperate because Biden told him not to cooperate. Republicans in congress then voted to find him in contempt of congress and wanted the DOJ to prosecute him. The DOJ then came through saying he didn’t do anything wrong because he just did what Biden told him to do. And being part of biden’s administration it’s only normal to do what the president asks.
If we want to go back even further iirc there was a special council investigation into Biden regarding a handful of documents found at biden’s home from the Obama administration. Biden apologized saying he forgot that he had those docs. He handed those docs over to investigators and fully cooperated with them. That whole situation ended with special investigators finding that Biden didn’t do anything malicious and just forgot to relinquish (I think it was literally 3) those docs when he left office in 2016. That should have been the end of it. Republicans then drudged things up and wanted his interview from that investigation. Presumably to make it look like Biden was guilty of the same crimes trump is guilty of.
Technically speaking though Biden is guilty of violating the presidential records act. The same act trump is/was being tried for in his classified documents case. The difference being that Trump willfully took boxes upon boxes of documents pertaining to our national security secrets to Mar-a-Lago when he left office and then refused to cooperate with the FBI when they called him out for it. This then forced the FBI to raid Mar-a-Lago to get the documents back. Biden on the other hand was just old and forgot about some work he took home. When he was called out about it he fully cooperated and gave the documents back.
It’s a little more complicated than that. The DoJ released the full transcript of all the interviews between the Special Counsel and President Biden. What’s at issue now is that Republicans also want the audio tapes of all those interviews.
The DoJ is pushing back, and saying that Congress has all the info they need already with the full transcript, and they dont need the audio. The only purpose for releasing the audio is to use sound bites in Republican campaign ads.
I actually wish Biden never claimed executive privilege on it, because there is nothing on that tape we don’t know. It’s all in the transcript. Claiming privilege makes it look like there’s secrets in it.
i also wish that the DoJ would have trotted out the 'No Legitimate Legislative Purpose" line that Barr did when he defied his subpoena. Because that is technically correct now: there is nothing to learn that we don’t already know from the transcript.
Thank you for providing that context. Good to know the situation is even dumber than I thought.
A trial and a verdict is needed to determine guilt so no Biden is not guilty of that as a fact.
I mean, I clearly didn’t mean he had a guilty judgment against him and the word guilty doesn’t necessarily always imply legally guilty. But fine. For semantic’s sake, He’s not “guilty”, but he did in fact violate the presidential records act. It was just decided that he wouldn’t be prosecuted because it was a just a small oversight. Which, to be clear, is a decision I agree with.