Former President Joe Biden has filed a federal lawsuit to block the Justice Department from releasing roughly 70 hours of audio recordings and transcripts tied to interviews he gave to his biographer before becoming president.
The lawsuit, filed Tuesday in federal court in Washington, D.C., seeks to stop the Trump Justice Department from handing over the materials to the House Judiciary Committee and the conservative Heritage Foundation.
The Justice Department has said it plans to release the files, with redactions, by June 15 unless a court intervenes.
The recordings were made in 2016 and 2017 while Biden was working with ghostwriter Mark Zwonitzer on his memoir, “Promise Me, Dad.”
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The book focused heavily on Biden’s personal life and the death of his son Beau Biden from brain cancer.
Those private conversations later became part of Special Counsel Robert Hur’s investigation into Biden’s handling of classified documents.
Hur’s report said Biden “willfully retained and disclosed” classified materials after leaving the vice presidency, but recommended no criminal charges.
The report concluded that prosecutors would likely face difficulty proving criminal intent to a jury, in part because of concerns about how Biden would be perceived as an elderly former president with memory issues.
One of the most politically damaging lines from the report described Biden as an “elderly man with a poor memory.”
That finding fueled intense debate over Biden’s fitness for office during the 2024 campaign and became one of the biggest political blows to his re-election effort.
The audio recordings are now at the center of a new legal fight.
Biden’s attorneys argue the tapes were private conversations recorded inside his home and should not be released publicly simply because they were obtained during a criminal investigation.
“Every American, including a sitting or former Vice President, has a right to privacy in the personal conversations he has within his own home,” the lawsuit states.
His legal team says the Justice Department has a special responsibility to protect private information gathered during criminal probes.
The Heritage Foundation has pushed for the recordings through Freedom of Information Act litigation, arguing the public has a right to hear material connected to Hur’s findings and Biden’s mental acuity.
The Justice Department previously resisted releasing the files while Biden was president.
But under the Trump administration, the department reversed course and informed Biden earlier this year that it intended to release the recordings and transcripts.
Biden’s attorneys say the department changed its position without a formal explanation.
The lawsuit also notes that the recordings at issue are separate from audio of Hur’s direct interview with Biden, which is involved in separate legal disputes.
Court records show Zwonitzer deleted portions of the audio after learning in 2023 that Hur had been appointed special counsel. Investigators later recovered the deleted files.
The Justice Department defended its planned release, saying the public should be able to hear the recordings and judge the matter for itself.
Trump also weighed in on Truth Social after the lawsuit became public, attacking Biden and accusing him of trying to hide the tapes.
The case now puts Biden on a direct legal collision course with the Trump Justice Department over privacy, transparency and the lingering fallout from the classified documents investigation.
Why It Matters
The recordings could revive questions about Biden’s handling of classified documents and his mental fitness during the years before and during his presidency. The lawsuit also raises a broader legal question: how much privacy former presidents and vice presidents retain when personal recordings become evidence in a federal investigation.
What Comes Next
A federal judge will decide whether to block the Justice Department from releasing the recordings by the June 15 deadline. If the tapes are released, they could become a major political flashpoint for Republicans and Democrats alike.
President Trump posts that Biden is suing the DOJ to block release of the special counsel audio recordings.
2025: Sleepy Joe’s 2023 Hur interview audio which shows him confused about classified documents and the Cancer Moonshot. pic.twitter.com/3zc1XP3ruM
— Liz Churchill (@liz_churchill10) May 27, 2026
