News/Commentary

The Biden ghostwriter tapes are out and it’s not good

July 28, 2026 | | Print Article

Newly released audio recordings appear to show that former President Joe Biden knew he had classified documents stashed at home.

The recordings were made by the ghostwriter who assisted the former president in the writing and publication of his 2017 book, “Promise Me, Dad.”

In one recording in which he was discussing a 2014 Situation Room meeting, Biden warned ghostwriter Mark Zwonitzer that “some of this may be classified … so, be careful.”

It’s not clear what “this” referred to.

Hit the play button below to hear Biden for yourself:

In a recording made on Feb. 16, 2017, less than a month after leaving office, Biden admitted to having just “found all the classified stuff downstairs.”

ADVERTISEMENT

This remark strongly suggested he had classified documents at his home and knew it.

Listen:

In another recording, the former president said, “The next thing I have here is, um, this is classified.”

Listen:

ADVERTISEMENT

These recordings were later obtained by special counsel Robert Hur during his classified documents investigation. Afterward, Republicans sought access to the records but were blocked by the former president’s attorneys. This changed on Friday when they “abandoned their lawsuit” and called “for a dismissal,” according to Fox News. A judge accepted the request on Monday.

The plaintiff in the case, Mike Howell of the Oversight Project, subsequently immediately released the records. The Oversight Project is now calling for the recordings to be used to finally hold Biden accountable.

“Robert Hur’s and Merrick Garland’s decision to give Biden a free pass for keeping and disclosing classified information must now be reexamined from top to bottom,” Oversight Project Vice President of Litigation Jeff Clark told Fox News.

ADVERTISEMENT

Recall that Hur ultimately chose not to prosecute Biden. He felt the jury would side with him because he came off as “a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.”

“Mr. Biden’s recorded conversations with Zwonitzer from 2017 are often painfully slow, with Mr. Biden struggling to remember events and straining at times to read and relay his own notebook entries,” Hur wrote in his final report.

“For these jurors, Mr. Biden’s apparent lapses and failures in February and April 2017 will likely appear consistent with the diminished faculties and faulty memory he showed in Zwonitzer’s interview recordings and in our interview of him,” he added.

Howell also noticed Biden frequently pausing and struggling to speak.

“We now know what has been long assumed: the autopen scandal extends far back beyond just when Joe Biden ‘ran’ for president from his basement,” he said in a statement. “These tapes have so many pauses and ‘ums’ that it sounds like Biden is buffering like a dial-up Internet connection.”

ADVERTISEMENT

Clark, for his part, seems to disagree with Hur’s decision not to prosecute based on Biden’s old age and slowness.

“The tapes make clear that Biden disclosed massive amounts of classified information to his ghost writer Marc Zwonitzer,” he tweeted after the release of the audio recordings.

Vivek Saxena
Latest posts by Vivek Saxena (see all)

Comment

We have no tolerance for comments containing violence, racism, profanity, vulgarity, doxing, or discourteous behavior. If a comment is spam, instead of replying to it please click the ∨ icon below and to the right of that comment. Thank you for partnering with us to maintain fruitful conversation.

Latest Articles