Appeals Court Rejects Biden Bid to Keep Memoir Interview Audio Private

Joe Biden suffered a legal setback after a federal appeals court rejected his effort to block the release of roughly 70 hours of audio recordings and transcripts from private interviews conducted with the ghostwriter of his memoirs. In a 2-1 decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled that the public interest outweighs Biden’s privacy concerns, although some information will be redacted before release.

The majority opinion was issued by Judges Sri Srinivasan and Gregory Katsas. They concluded that Biden still has legitimate privacy interests but determined they could be protected through limited redactions. Writing for the majority, the judges said the remaining «incursion on personal privacy… does not outweigh the public interest in disclosure.» The ruling moves the recordings one step closer to becoming public.

Judge Florence Pan disagreed with the majority and argued that Biden retained a substantial privacy interest in the recordings. She noted that the conversations took place entirely inside Biden’s private home and were later seized during an investigation that ultimately ended without criminal charges. In her view, those circumstances justified keeping the recordings confidential despite public interest in the case.

The recordings date back to 2016 and 2017, when author Mark Zwonitzer interviewed Biden while helping write his memoirs, including Promise Me, Dad. Many of the conversations covered Biden’s personal life, political career and the illness and death of his eldest son, Beau. They remained private for years before later becoming evidence in a federal investigation.

The audio entered government custody during Special Counsel Robert Hur’s investigation into Biden’s handling of classified documents after leaving the vice presidency. Hur ultimately declined to bring criminal charges but drew widespread attention by describing Biden as a «well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.» That assessment quickly became a central point of political debate.

After Hur’s report was released, The Heritage Foundation and several Republican lawmakers filed Freedom of Information Act requests seeking the complete recordings. They argued that Americans should be allowed to hear the material for themselves and compare it with Hur’s conclusions instead of relying solely on the written report released by the special counsel.

The dispute intensified after U.S. District Judge Dabney Friedrich ruled in June that the recordings could be released. Biden’s lawyers immediately appealed, arguing the interviews were deeply personal conversations recorded inside his home while he worked on his memoirs. They compared the material to diary entries or private communications that were never intended for public release.

Biden’s attorneys also argued that he is now a private citizen and should receive the same legal privacy protections as anyone else. Court filings emphasized that many of the recordings involve highly personal family discussions, including conversations about Beau Biden’s illness and death, and maintained that releasing them would invade deeply private aspects of his life.

The Department of Justice took the opposite view. Government lawyers argued that the public has an important interest in hearing the evidence that Special Counsel Robert Hur relied upon when deciding not to pursue criminal charges. According to the DOJ, releasing the recordings with appropriate redactions would promote transparency while still protecting genuinely private information.

Although Biden lost the appeal, the recordings will not become public immediately. The appeals court paused its ruling until Aug. 3, giving Biden’s legal team time to request a rehearing before the full D.C. Circuit or file an emergency appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court. Those options represent his final opportunities to prevent disclosure.

If no higher court intervenes before the deadline, the Department of Justice will release the redacted audio recordings and transcripts to Congress and the public. Biden has not personally commented on the ruling, leaving his legal position to be expressed through court filings. The eventual release could reignite political debate over Hur’s investigation and provide the public with direct access to interviews that have remained unheard for nearly a decade.