US president says his reminiscence is ‘fine’ after particular counsel report says he couldn’t recall the yr his son died.
United States President Joe Biden has defended his reminiscence after a particular counsel report into his dealing with of labeled paperwork renewed scrutiny of his health for workplace forward of the presidential election in November.
In emotional and at occasions offended remarks, Biden took intention at Special Counsel Robert Hur for locating that his reminiscence was so “severely limited” when interviewed by prosecutors that he couldn’t bear in mind the yr he started serving as vice chairman beneath President Barack Obama or the yr his son Beau died.
“There’s even reference that I don’t remember when my son died,” Biden mentioned throughout a press convention on the White House on Thursday. “How in the hell dare he raise that?”
“I don’t need anyone to remind me when he passed away,” Biden mentioned of his son, who handed away from mind most cancers in 2015.
Biden, who’s the oldest US president in historical past and can be 86 on the finish of a second time period in workplace, mentioned his reminiscence is “fine” and “has not gotten worse.”
Biden, who is predicted to face off in opposition to former President Donald Trump in November, mentioned he had undergone hours of interviews with prosecutors within the quick aftermath of the “international crisis” that was sparked by Hamas’s October 7 assault on Israel.
He additionally disputed a few of Hur’s assertions about his culpability in mishandling delicate paperwork, denying that he had shared labeled data together with his ghostwriter.
Hur’s report launched on Thursday mentioned Biden wouldn’t face prison prices for eradicating labeled paperwork on the finish of the Obama presidency as a result of he had cooperated with investigators and would seem sympathetic to a jury.
“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 wrote in his report.
Hur, a former federal prosecutor through the Trump administration, was appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland to probe Biden’s dealing with of labeled materials after the invention of delicate paperwork at his personal workplace in Washington, DC.
Subsequent searches of his house in Delaware and the University of Delaware turned up extra delicate paperwork that had been improperly eliminated.
Biden’s age has emerged as a critical concern for US voters and Democratic Party officers, who’ve for essentially the most half shared their qualms in personal discussions with colleagues and journalists.
In a ballot launched by Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research final yr, 77 % of respondents, together with 69 % of Democrats, mentioned Biden is just too outdated to control till 2028.
US House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican, mentioned that Biden’s press convention following the particular counsel report confirmed he’s “not fit” to be president.
Biden has made a sequence of gaffes in latest days which have refocused consideration on his age and psychological acuity.
On Wednesday, Biden appeared to confuse former German chancellors Angela Merkel and Helmut Kohl when he instructed a marketing campaign occasion he met Kohl at a G7 assembly in 2021, 4 years after Kohl’s loss of life.
The mix-up got here days after Biden recalled talking with French President Francois Mitterrand, who died in 1996, on the similar G7 occasion, as a substitute of present chief Emmanuel Macron.
During his remarks defending his reminiscence on Thursday, Biden additionally referred to Egyptian chief Abdel Fattah el-Sisi because the “president of Mexico”.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/2/9/how-in-the-hell-dare-he-biden-defends-memory-after-documents-probe?traffic_source=rss
