House Republicans will move forward with contempt of Congress charges against Attorney General Merrick Garland next week over his refusal to comply with a subpoena for audio recordings of President Biden’s interview with former Special Counsel Robert Hur.
The House Judiciary Committee plans to hold a markup meeting on May 16, where members will debate and consider adding amendments to the contempt resolution before sending it to the full House for a vote, a source familiar with the matter confirmed to The Post.
Garland was issued a subpoena for the audio files of Biden’s lengthy interview with Hur, as part of the former special counsel’s investigation into the president’s handling of classified White House documents, in late February by House Oversight Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.).
The subpoena was issued after the top Justice Department official initially failed to comply with a request from the committees for documents related to the two-day-long interview.
A transcript of Hur’s Oct. 8 and Oct. 9 interviews with the 81-year-old president was eventually released by the DOJ, which showed Biden confused key dates during the sitdowns, including forgetting which year his son Beau died of brain cancer and the year Donald Trump was elected president.
In an 11-page letter sent to the two committees last month, Assistant Attorney General Carlos Uriarte rejected claims that the interview recordings contain information relevant to the Republican-led impeachment inquiry into Biden.
Uriarte called contempt threats over the tapes “unjustifiable,” arguing that Garland had adequately complied with the subpoena by releasing the interview transcripts.
“If the Committees’ goal is to receive information from the Department in furtherance of your investigations, that goal has been more than met,” Uriarte wrote. “Our cooperation has been extraordinary.”
“We do not obtain evidence for criminal investigations so that it may later be deployed for political purposes,” he added.
Hur, a former Trump-appointed US attorney for the District of Maryland, submitted his findings about Biden’s handling of classified information in early February.
His 388-page bombshell report noted there was evidence that the commander in chief “willfully retained and disclosed classified materials,” but his team concluded there wasn’t enough to prove it “beyond a reasonable doubt.”
Hur also expressed concern that a jury would perceive the oldest president in US history as a “sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.”
