'Biden's memory is hazy, poor, fuzzy,' says report on US President

Lingering concerns about President Joe Biden's age and ability have deepened after a special report probing his possession of classified documents described the 81-year-old’s memory as ‘hazy’ and ‘poor’.

The report on Thursday said the Democrat's memory was ‘hazy,’ ‘fuzzy’, ‘faulty’, ‘poor’ and having ‘significant limitations’. It said that Biden could not recall defining milestones in his own life.

"He did not remember when he was vice president, forgetting on the first day of the interview when his term ended ('if it was 2013 — when did I stop being Vice President?'), and forgetting on the second day of the interview when his term began ('in 2009, am I still Vice President?')," the report said. “He did not remember, even within several years, when his son Beau died.”

Undermining Biden

While Biden won’t face charges for mishandling classified documents, the report's claims about his memory could undermine Biden's message to voters that he can manage the government and safeguard the US.

Voters are going into this year's election with severe misgivings about Biden's age, having scrutinized his gaffes, his coughing, his slow walking and even a tumble off his bicycle.

In ruling out a prosecution of Biden over his retention of highly classified materials as a private citizen, the report suggested he would seem too feeble to prosecute.

“It would be difficult to convince a jury that they should convict him — by then a former president well into his eighties — of a serious felony that requires a mental state of willfulness.”

The White House pushed back on the characterisations of Biden's memory in a February 5 letter from the president's lawyers that was published in special counsel Robert Hur's report.

The letter argues that Biden's “inability to recall dates or details of events that happened years ago is neither surprising nor unusual,” particularly about when certain documents were packed or moved.

It is not unusual for the subjects of government investigations to say they don't recall an event or a conversation in order to avoid issues such as perjury.

The special counsel did not release the transcript of the interviews with Biden, so some context is unclear.

Former President Donald Trump, the current Republican front-runner, has boasted of his own vast memory but has also at times said in legal proceedings that he does not recall certain events.

Age, memory issues

Biden noted in a statement issued on Thursday that he had sat for five hours of interviews with Hur's team over two days on October 8 and 9, “even though Israel had just been attacked on October 7th and I was in the middle of handling an international crisis”.

In an August poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs, 77 per cent of US adults said Biden was too old to be effective for four more years.

It was one of the rare sources of bipartisan agreement during a politically polarized era, with 89 per cent of Republicans and 69 per cent of Democrats saying Biden's age is a problem.

Haley or Pelosi?

The release of the report overlapped with recent Biden speeches in which he mistakenly claimed to talk with European leaders — France's Francois Mitterrand and Germany's Helmut Kohl — who had not held office since the 1990s and had died several years ago.

The 77-year-old Trump also faces questions about recent memory lapses.

In a January speech, Trump mistakenly and repeatedly confused former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, his major opponent for the GOP nomination, with Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.

Republican attack

But Republican critics were quick to pile on Thursday as the special counsel's report became public.

Rep. Tom Emmer, R-Minn., said on X that the report was “alarming” and it's clear that Biden “does not have the cognitive ability to be President”.

“If you're too senile to stand trial, then you're too senile to be president. Joe Biden is unfit to lead this nation,” said Alex Pfeiffer, a spokesman for Make America Great Again Inc., the main super PAC backing Trump's candidacy.

(With agency inputs)