Former President Joe Biden plans to go to court to block the Trump administration from releasing roughly 70 hours of partially redacted audio recordings of his conversations with a ghostwriter, the Justice Department said in new court filings Friday.
DOJ attorneys told U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich that they expected Biden to seek to “prevent any such disclosures” of the recordings to both Congress and the conservative Heritage Foundation, which filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit to access the materials. The Justice Department set a Tuesday deadline for Biden to file legal action and agreed to hold off on any release until June 15 if he does.
A spokesperson for Biden confirmed Sunday that the former president plans to fight the release.
“President Biden 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,” spokesperson TJ Ducklo said in a statement. “The DOJ themselves have said these tapes serve no public interest.”
What the Audio Is, and Why It Matters
The recordings were gathered by investigators working for Special Counsel Robert Hur, who was appointed by then-Attorney General Merrick Garland in January 2023 to investigate Biden’s handling of classified materials. The probe began after documents turned up at a University of Pennsylvania think tank Biden had been affiliated with post-vice presidency, and later at his Delaware home.
Mark Zwonitzer, a writer and documentary filmmaker, worked with Biden on two memoirs: “Promises to Keep,” published in 2007, and “Promise Me, Dad,” released in 2017. The latter book dealt with the death of Biden’s son Beau. The audio now at issue was recorded during sessions for that second memoir.
Hur’s report, released in February 2024, concluded that Biden “willfully retained and disclosed classified materials” but declined to bring charges, citing Biden’s cooperation with the probe and the likelihood that a jury would view him as a “sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.”
The recordings DOJ now seeks to release reportedly include sessions in which Biden read aloud from notebooks that officials later determined contained classified entries. According to exchanges cited in Hur’s report, the audio also captures Biden telling Zwonitzer, “I just found all the classified stuff downstairs.”
Biden has repeatedly contested that characterization. “I did not share classified information,” he said in February 2024. “Guarantee you, I did not.”
The recordings and transcripts DOJ plans to make public are expected to be edited for privacy purposes and to remove any underlying classified information before release.
Ghostwriter Attempted to Delete the Recordings
Zwonitzer did not simply hand the recordings over. According to Hur’s report, he moved audio files into his computer’s recycle bin after learning that a special counsel had been appointed. Investigators recovered the recordings, and Zwonitzer was later granted immunity by prosecutors in exchange for his cooperation.
Hur considered but ultimately declined to charge Zwonitzer with obstruction of justice, finding insufficient evidence to prove criminal intent beyond a reasonable doubt.
Biden’s Legal Arguments Are Uncertain
Biden’s attorneys have not yet specified what legal arguments they plan to raise. Potential avenues include arguing that the recordings are personal records rather than federal ones, or that releasing them would invade his privacy. Those arguments, however, are unlikely to block disclosure to Congress.
To stop Congress from getting the recordings, Biden would need to argue that lawmakers are unfairly targeting him because of his former office and that the materials aren’t necessary for any legitimate legislation.
There is relevant precedent. In a 2020 Supreme Court ruling involving House requests for Donald Trump’s financial records, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote that “Congressional demands for the President’s papers can implicate the relationship between the branches regardless whether those papers are personal or official.” The case was remanded to lower courts to weigh Congress’s need against Trump’s interest in avoiding harassment, and the parties ultimately reached a settlement in which a limited set of records was produced.
Heritage Foundation Presses On
The Heritage Foundation’s Oversight Project filed the original FOIA lawsuit seeking the materials. Mike Howell, president of the project, had little patience for Biden’s move Sunday.
“These tapes will further prove the massive lie regarding Biden’s fitness for office and the fact Biden revealed classified information,” Howell said. “The shenanigans aren’t over: At the last possible second, and after every delay tactic possible, the autopen is objecting to the American People receiving transparency.”
Biden’s office countered by pointing to a separate set of records the Trump administration has not released. “What’s happening now isn’t about transparency. It’s about politics,” Ducklo said, calling on the administration to release Volume 2 of Special Counsel Jack Smith’s report on Trump’s own alleged mishandling of classified documents. “That report contains information Americans actually deserve to see.”
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