The Department of Justice has "determined" that Attorney General Merrick Garland did not commit a crime by defying congressional subpoenas for the audio of President Joe Biden's interview with Special Counsel Robert Hur. As such, no charges will be brought against Garland for his refusal to cooperate and lawmakers are no closer to obtaining the apparently damning recording of Biden.
The news came in a June 14 letter to House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) from Assistant Attorney General Carlos Felipe Uriarte as the Justice Department's official response to the House voting to hold Garland in contempt of Congress this week and directing the DOJ to prosecute him for his defiance.
"The longstanding position of the Department is that we will not prosecute an official for contempt of Congress for declining to provide subpoenaed information subject to a presidential assertion of executive privilege," Uriarte explained before citing past examples under the administrations of Presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama, and Donald Trump where executive branch officials were held in contempt of Congress but were not prosecuted because their noncompliance was based on a presidential assertion of executive privilege.
"Consistent with this longstanding position and uniform practice, the Department has determined that the responses by Attorney General Garland to the subpoenas issued by the Committees did not constitute a crime, and accordingly the Department will not bring the congressional contempt citation before a grand jury or take any other action to prosecute the Attorney General," the letter declared.
"The question that should be asked is what are they hiding, and why?" noted House Majority Whip Tom Emmer (R-MN) earlier this week. "These are fundamental questions behind House Republicans' resolution this week to hold Attorney General Merrick Garland in Contempt of Congress for refusing to comply with our lawfully issued subpoenas."
Speaking to the investigation of Biden's improper handling of classified documents, Emmer reminded "Hur concluded that, although President Biden ‘willfully retained and disclosed classified materials as a private citizen,’ criminal charges were not warranted because Biden is an ‘elderly man with a poor memory,'" a "stark contrast" with the 37-count indictment Donald Trump was hit with from the special counsel overseeing the former president's conduct.
"While the Justice Department handed over the transcript of Biden’s interview with Hur, they've denied and refused to hand over the corresponding audio recordings," Emmer continued. "This is a problem for a couple of reasons: First, transcripts do not and cannot capture things like tone, inflection, pace, and pauses that fully convey a person’s message," the Minnesota Republican emphasized. "The audio recordings are necessary to adequately evaluate Special Counsel Hur’s assessment about President Biden’s memory and to determine whether the DOJ is engaging in a two-tiered application of justice by refusing to indict Joe Biden."
The second problem pointed out by Emmer: "The White House has a history of editing official transcripts to cover up Biden’s gaffes. If the interview audio matches the transcript, why not release it? Why not comply with our subpoenas? Is Biden’s Department of Justice covering for their boss?" he questioned.