Rations. We are talking about right what about russians . There are a fraction of the last two years, a fraction of the children that have been killed in gaza. There has been 17,000 orphans in gaza right now in the last four or five months. And our country is funding it. Our tax money. Why are you taking money from aipac . Stop taking money from aipac. This is funding genocide. Look at these pictures. These are real children. They have lost their limbs by amputation, all without anesthesia, hospitals, schools, mosques, 6000 bombs. In the first month. Gaza, the size of philadelphia. This meeting will come towit the chair is authorized to declare a recess at any time. We authorized todays hearing on the special counsel robert mueller. The chair now recognizes the gentleman from the state of wisconsin for the purpose of leading us in the pledge. ■c nikki i pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of america and tohe indivisible with liberty and justice for all. Opening statements of that witness we will each receive witnesses and five minutes to question the witness. The china recognizesthemselves for an Opening Statement. Robert hur was appointed special counsel on january 12, 2023. He had a fundamental question to address. Did show bryden unlawfully retain classified information . The answer, jyyes he did. s pag one of the report says this. Our investigation uncovered evidence that President Biden will for he retained and disclosed classified materials after his vice presidency when he was a private citizen. He further writes that mr. Biden retained marked classified documents about afghanistan and handwritten notes in his notebooks, which ■ places in his home. Joe biden kept classified information and joe biden failed to store classified information properly. Mr. Hur made these determinations after interviewing witnesses and looking through emails, text messages, videos, phone records, and other materials from both classified and ■s unclassified sources. But there is more. Joe biden not on the kept information he was not allowed to keep and not only failed to secure that information properly, but he also shared it with people who were not allowed to see at. He shared that information with his ghostwriter. And, remember, this is information that only individuals with a security clearance are supposed to see. Mr. Hur put us on the 200th pageofit is the kind of information that risks serious damage to Americas National security. And what did joe biden have to say about all this . What was his explanation . On page 94 of mr. Hurs report, joe biden said he took his notebooks with him after his vice presidency because, they are mine. And every president has done the same exact thing. Nevermind the fact he had never been president when he took this information, but what bide feeling and title. You can feel the arrogance in this statement. They are mine. But even with all that, mr. Hur chose not to bring charges because mr. Biden would likely present himself to a jury as he did in his interview of him as a sympathetic, wellmeaning man with a poor memory. A forgetful old man who mr. Hur said did not remember when he was Vice President , forgetting on the first day of the interview when his term ended and forgetting on the second day of the interview when his term as Vice President began. But in the end it boils down to a few key facts. Joe biden kept classified information. Joe biden failed to properly secure classified information. And joe biden shared classified information with people he was not supposed to joe biden broke the law. And because he is a forgetful old man who would appear sympathetic to a jury, mr. Yhu mr. Hur, we think it is important that you be able to respond to President Bidens response to your report so we will provide a short video of mr. Bidens press conference after your report was released because there are things that the president of the net estates says that are directly by what you found in your report. So if we can play that video. Hey, everybody. Good evening. Let me say a few things before i take questions. As you know, the special counsel has released its findings today about they are looking into my handling of classified documents. Reporter President Biden, Something Special counsel said in its report is one of the reasons you were not charged is because in his description, you are a wellmeaning elderly man with a poor memory. I am wellmeaning and i am a elderly man and i know what i am doing. I am president and i have taken this country back on its feet. China how bad is yourcontinue a president . My memory is so bad i let you speak. Your memory has gotten worse mr. President . My memory is fine. Take a look at what i have done since ive become president. No one else could pass any of the things i got past. How did that happen . I guess i just forgot. Mr. President. Mr. President. Reporter do you fear this report is only going to fare ■j fuher concns. Reporter mr. President mr. President mr. President reporter due take responsibility for being careless with classified material . I take responsibility for not having seen exactly what my staff was doing. It goes in and it goes out. Things that appeared in my garage. Things atme in and out of my home and things that were not moved by me but my staff. My staff. Reporter mr. President mr. President mr. President r months, you would respond with the words watch me. Many people have been watching and they have expressed concerns about your age. That is your judgment. That is not your that is not the judgment of the press. Reporter they say that you are too old. Mr. President , in december he told me you believe there are many other democrats who could defeat donald trump so why does it have toyou now . I am the most qualified person in the United States to be president. Reporter why are you refusing the names of our leaders . I did not share assified information. I did not share with my ghostwriter. I did not say that. I did not say that. Reporter mr. President . Let me answer your question. The fact of the matter is what i did not want repeated i did not read it to him. I had written a long memorandum to president obama why we should not be in afghanistan. Multiple pages. And so what i was referring to, isa classified. I should have said it should be private because it was a contact between the president and the Vice President. That is what is it was not classified information in that document. Reporter mr. President why not . Thank you so much, you guys. President he called on me. When you look back on this incident there any think you would do differently now, and you think a special prosecutor should have been appointed in the first place in bothofthese cases. First of all, what i would have done is oversee the transfer of material that was in my office my offices. I should have done that. I look back i did not have the responsibility to do that in they referenced that in the report and my staff did not do it in the way that for example, i did not know how half the boxes got in my garage until i found out that staff gathered them up, put them together, and put them into the garage and my home. And all of them are in filing cabinets that were able to be locked accessed. It was locked and not in a place like maralago. And none of it was classified. It did not have that red stuff around the corners. None of that. I wish i had paid more attention to how the documents were being moved. I thought they were being moved to the archives. That is what i thought. Now what is the last part of your question . A special counsel should have been appointed in this case and in the case of your i think a special counsel should have been appointed, and the reason i think a special counsel should have been appointed as i did not want to be in a position where they looked at trump and not me just president. And the fact is that they made a firm conclusion i did not break the law. Period. Thank you very much. Reporter mr. Biden mr. President israel the hostage neti i am of the view, as you know, e in gaza in the gaza strip has been overthetop. I think that, as you know, initially, the president of mexico, cc, did not want to open up the gate to allow material to get in. I talked to him. Make them part of the middle east and recognize it fully and return for certain things and the United States will commit to do. And the commitment that we were proposing to do related to two items. I am not going to go into detail, but one of them was to against their archenemy to the north west northeast, i prov ammunition and material for them to defend themselves. Coincidentally, that is the timeframe when this broke out. I have no proof of what i am about to say but it is not unreasonable to suspect that hamas understood what it was aboutoto break it up before it happened. Reporter thank you everybody we are going everybody to hold for a moment. The chair now recognizes that Ranking Member for an openg mr. Chairman, i am glad you have such information. That you allowed him to take the first 10 mins of this hearing. Mr. Chairman, House Republicans may be desperate to convince america that white, conservative men are on the losing end of a two tiered Justice System, a theory that appears to the maga crowd that has no basis in reality. The hur report does help to draw a distinction between mr. Trump and President Biden, noyo first, the report is clear that at no point did the special counsel find evenreason to believe that the information will be used to benefit a foreign nation. With respect to the documents found in mr. Bidens possession the decision to pursue criminal charges for straightforward. In respect to the special ■< counsel investigation mr. Biden turned the documents to the National Archives and department of justice, consented to the search of multiple locations, including his homes, sat for a voluntary interview, and in other ways cooperated with the investigation. President biden acted responsibly, cooperated completely, and the decision to decline criminal justice to decline criminal charges was va relatively straightforward. In short, to borrow a phrase from the last administration, the hur report represents the complete and total exoneration of President Biden. How does that record contrast with President Trump . The documents he retained and the criminal charges pending against him in florida . We know that trump deliberately took large amounts of classified information from the white house. He has admitted as much, etendi classified this information without telling anyone on his way out the door. We know that he stored that information around maralago in the craziest of places. On the ballroom stage. Spilled acnext to the toilet. We know that he showed classified military plan to an author. I could have declassified it, trump says on the recording. Now i cant, you know, but this is still a secret. Still a secret. So much for the de that trump is alleged to have had shared these classified documents with many other visitors to maralago, and we know despite this outrageous conduct, department of justice give trump every opportunity to avoid criminal charges. Again, in the special counsels words, after being given multiple chances to return and prosecution, mr. Trump allegedly did the opposite. He not only refused to return the documents for many months, but he also obstructed justice by enlisting others to destroy evidence and then to lie about. Why did the president charge former President Trump but not President Biden . Not because of some vast conspiracy. Not because of the socalled deep state being out to get him, but because former President Trump was fundamentally incapable of taking advantage of even one of the many, many chances he was given to take those charges which brings me to the second distinction this report helps us to between President Biden and donald trump. Simply put, President Biden had the mental acuity to navigate this situation. Natrump did not. Much has been made of the special counsels gratuitous bidens age. T president but lets set the context. After returning every classified document, after opening his home to federal investigators, while simultaneously managing the first hours of the crisis in israel, President Biden volunteered to sit through a ■ special counsel. I believe as is his habit, President Biden probably committed a verbal slip or two during the interview. And i am not sure any of that matters because when the interview was over, mr. Hur completely exonerated President Biden. And then there is donald trump. What kind of man bungs one but dozens of opportunities to avoid criminal liability . What does that say about his mental state . Here too, the record speaks for itself. One of the great memories do names. Dont remember the names. Viktor orban. Anyone ever hear of him . He is the leader of turkey. Nikki Haley Nikki Haley is in charge of security. Three years later. How about that . Did you actually have a one onone with comey then . Not that i remember. Nobody speaks in. Saudi arabia. Russia. I have a really good memory. By the name of marla maples. That is ray. You recall what years you are married . Um. It is up here and called memory and other things. I dont remember that. And putin has so little respect for obama that he is starting to throw around the nuclear term. We have to win in november or we will not have pennsylvania. They will change the name. I talked to putin a lot. I dont remember that. I saw that this morning. A good memory and all that stf. Were fighting isis, i defeated isis in four weeks. And we did with obama we won an election that everyone socannot be won. You are going to be there first. I know my people are going to say, all right, trump, you did a good job. Get out of here. That is a man who is crimina liability. A man who is wholly unfit for office. And a man who at the very least ought to think twice before accusing others of cognitive decline. Thank you for being here today, mr. Hur. Thank illuminating a stark choice for the country in the months to come. I look forward to urback. The gentleman yields back. The gentleman now recognizes that chairman mr. , for an Opening Statement. Thank you. In august 2022 President Biden question in a 60 minutes interview how anyone can be that irresponsible well when asked about classified documents in the possession of former President Trump but when President Biden said this he knew that he had stashed classified materials in several unsecured locations for years dating back to his time as Vice President and even as a u. S. Senator. President biden, the white house, and his personal with the American People about his willful retention of classified material and continue to hide information from congress. He first claim to discovered material on november 2nd 2022. However, President Biden and his lawyers kept it se the American People before the midterm elections. Cbs news broke the story in to wonder if the white house had any intention of ever disclosing that President Biden hoarded classified documents for years. One of my first actions after becoming head of the Oversight Committee was to launch an investigation to President Bidens mishandling of classified documents. This investigation started before special counsel hur was named, and what we found was al information obtained through multiple transcribed interviews conducted by the Oversight Committee contradict the whitehouses and President Bidens narrative about the discovery of classified documents at the Penn Biden Center. In fact, the real timeline began in the spring of 2021, not november 2022 as the white house claims. Additionally, the classified documents were not kept in a locked closet as asserted by the whitehouse. We also learned that five white house at employees were involved in the early stages of court needing the organizing, moving, and removing of boxes that were later found that contained classified materials. There is no reasonle explanation as to why so many white house employees were concerned with retrieving boxes they only believed contained personal documents and materials. Lighted President Biden keep the specific documents in unsecured locations for years . Many questions remain. But now the white house is obstructing congress as we seek the truth for the American People. We subpoenaed former whitl to a deposition to provide information to our committee but the white house is seeking to block her testimony. We have also subpoenaed the department of justice for audio recordings and transcripts of special bidens interview with special counsel hur. These were due the morning of the state of the union. Only this morning, a couple of hours before the hearing, the department of justice finally provided the transcript of his interviewi hur. The timing is not coincidental. We have had little time to review the transcripts, but what we have seen is that the white house did not want special counsel hurs final report to be released. The white house has refused to be transparent about the president s mishandling of classified documents and, worse, they appear to have lied about the timeline, about who handled the documents, and even the contents of President Bidens interview with special counsel hur. That is why todays ararency is