Former President Joe Biden’s legal team will push back against the Justice Department’s impending release of redacted written transcripts and audio recordings of his interview sessions with the ghostwriter for his book.
Assistant Attorney General Civil Division Brett Shumate wrote in a court filing that the former president’s lawyers “advised the Department that he intends to seek to intervene to prevent any such disclosures” and that the Justice Department “does not oppose intervention.”
The DOJ further stated that the former president is expected to try to “prevent any such disclosures” of the tapes. The Trump administration is seeking to share the recordings with Congress and the Heritage Foundation after it filed a FOIA request in 2024 to obtain the transcripts and recording of Biden’s interactions with his ghostwriter.
Biden’s attorneys contend that that the recordings were provided to the DOJ with the understanding that they would remain private, according to Politico. His spokesperson emphasized that the former president “cooperated fully with Special Counsel Hur, and agreed to provide audiotapes of conversations with his biographer for a book about his deceased son on the condition that they would not be made public.”
Wouldn’t want transparency, would we?
— Leftism Delenda Est (@old_take) May 10, 2026
Biden seeks to block DOJ release of 2017 audio, court filing says https://t.co/GYjMFYDLoD #FoxNews
They further suggested that the DOJ “said these tapes serve no public interest.”
This dispute is connected to Special Counsel Robert Hur’s investigation into Biden’s handling of classified documents. The probe ended without charges against the former president, but raised concerns about his memory and cognitive decline.
In some of the recordings, Biden shows he was clearly not up to par mentally, forgetting the year his son passed away and saying he “just found all the classified stuff downstairs.”
However, the Heritage Foundation argues that publicizing the tapes is necessary for transparency and accountability.
Biden’s legal intervention could delay the release of the tapes and documents until June 15. But, one way or another, those recordings will be made public. It doesn’t seem the former president has the law on his side with this one. There does not appear to be anything that could stop the DOJ from releasing the recordings. Even if a rogue judge tries to stop them, the DOJ will win in the end.
In essence, this is just another ploy to prevent the public from seeing even more evidence that the former president was not fit to serve in the White House. His cognitive problems were on full display for the nation to see regardless of how hard his team worked to conceal his issues.