A flurry of GOP lawmakers on Thursday immediately seized on the accounts of President Biden’s hazy memory that were detailed in special counsel Robert Hur’s report on the president’s handling of classified government documents.
Mr. Hur described the president as a “sympathetic, well-meaning elderly man with a poor memory.” He detailed several instances in which Mr. Biden forgot key facts such as when he was vice president in the Obama administration.
He did not recommend criminal charges against Mr. Biden.
According to the report, Mr. Biden asked investigators when he stopped being vice president or when his term began as vice president.
The report said Mr. Biden asked investigators, “When did I stop being vice president?” He later asked them if he was vice president in 2009, which would have been his first year in that position under President Obama.
In a joint statement, the House GOP leadership said the memory lapses were one of the most “disturbing parts” of the report.
Mr. Hur said he was not bringing criminal charges against Mr. Biden because he could convince a jury that the president held a “mental state of willfulness” that a serious felony requires.
“A man too incapable of being held accountable for mishandling classified information is certainly unfit for the Oval Office,” they said.
Other GOP lawmakers issued equally brutal responses.
Sen. Lindsey Graham, South Carolina Republican, called the report “unnerving” and said it could harm the U.S. standing in the world.
“I don’t know what to tell people,” he told reporters after the report.
Sen. Tommy Tuberville, Alabama Republican, echoed similar remarks on X.
Mr. Biden “doesn’t remember being VP. Does anyone believe he’s running the country now as POTUS?” he wrote.
Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri chimed in similarly: “Biden doesn’t remember his time as VP? But somehow he’s qualified to be President for another 4 years.”
Sen. Rick Scott of Florida called for Mr. Biden to be removed via the 25th Amendment’s provisions for dealing with an incapacitated president, based on Mr. Hur’s description of the president’s memory.
“That does not describe someone who should be the Commander in Chief of our armed forces and the defender of American freedoms,” he said.
Sen. Eric Schmitt of Missouri simply tweeted a siren emoji and quoted the report saying, “He did not remember when he was Vice President.”
“Biden’s DOJ is claiming that he is too mentally incompetent to stand trial,” Mr. Schmitt posted on Instagram. “How can he be mentally competent to serve another four years as president?”
The lapses were many and varied, and were revealed at the end of a week that also featured multiple appearances in which Mr. Biden said he spoke to long-dead foreign leaders and couldn’t remember the name of the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas.
In talking with investigators about the documents, he also couldn’t remember the year his son Beau died and forgot key details about a meeting to debate over a military operation in Afghanistan during the Obama administration.
As an example of what Mr. Hur called a “hazy” memory, Mr. Biden mistakenly told investigators that he “had a real difference” of opinion with a top U.S. general. In fact, the general was an ally who agreed with Mr. Biden, according to a memo detailing their conversation.
White House officials said the criticism of Mr. Biden’s memory in the Hur report was out of line.
White House counsel Richard Sauber and Bob Bauer, Mr. Biden’s personal attorney, criticized the comments about the president’s memory in statements.
In fact, the two wrote a letter to Mr. Hur on Monday saying that detailing the president’s memory issues was “entirely superfluous.”
In a follow-up statement after the report was released, Mr. Bauer accused the special counsel of “ investigative excess” and using “prejudicial language” to describe Mr. Biden’s lack of recall.
Meanwhile, Mr. Sauber said the comments about Mr. Biden’s memory were “inaccurate and inappropriate.”
• Jeff Mordock can be reached at jmordock@washingtontimes.com.
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