A report from special investigator Robert Haar has raised serious questions regarding the memory of U.S. President Joe Biden, prompting a strong response from Biden. Despite Haar opposing the prosecution of Biden and accusing him of retaining some classified government documents, Haar, who previously worked in the administration of former President Donald Trump, stated that the 81-year-old Biden would likely present himself in any trial as an "elderly man with good intentions who suffers from memory issues."
In his report, Haar criticized Biden for improperly retaining and storing some classified documents. Shortly after the report was released, Biden held an urgent press conference at the White House to tell journalists, "My memory is good." The report indicated that the president's memory "appeared to suffer from evident shortcomings." There are hundreds of excerpts in the report that raise questions about Biden's memory and mental capacity.
One excerpt describes an extensive interview with Mark Zounetizer, the undisclosed author of a book about Joe Biden, who mentioned that the president struggles to remember specific events during his tenure as Vice President under Barack Obama. The report states, "Biden's recorded conversations with Zounetizer in 2017 were either painfully slow due to Biden's difficulties in remembering events, or he sometimes preferred to refer back to his written notes."
The report later discusses Biden's interviews with Haar, which Biden volunteered for last year, describing the president's memory as having worsened. It states, "In our interview, Biden's memory had deteriorated; he did not remember when he was vice president, forgetting on the first day of the interview when his term in that position ended, and forgot on the following day when it started."
Additionally, the report describes how Biden struggled to recall key events that caused significant disputes at the beginning of the Obama administration. Specifically, it mentions that Biden had difficulty remembering details regarding disagreements within the Obama administration about U.S. troops in Afghanistan in 2009, when Biden opposed the deployment of an additional 30,000 soldiers to support Hamid Karzai's government and suggested expanding special operations and drone strikes instead.
The report notes, "His memory appeared fragmented when he began recalling the Afghanistan dispute, which was significant for him, among other matters, and he incorrectly stated that he had a 'disagreement' with General Karl Eikenberry, while the General was actually an ally and supporter of Biden, as indicated in a memo Biden wrote to President Obama at the time."
The report also highlights that Biden does not remember when his son died, stating that he "could not even recall, even within a few years, when his son Beau passed away." Beau, who served as a soldier in Iraq and was a former attorney general in Delaware, died in 2015 at the age of 46, an event Biden considered one of the worst days of his life.
While Haar's report provided examples to illustrate Biden's declining memory and mental abilities, it was met with criticism from Democrats. Biden's special advisor, Richard Super, criticized the report, urging Haar to review it again concerning "President Biden's memory to align with your experiences." Super stated that the description of the president's memory was "not accurate or suitable" and inappropriate for a report related to the Department of Justice.
