Remarks turn to partisan slugfest

The special counsel who investigated US President Joe Biden's handling of classified documents defended his controversial remarks about his memory on Tuesday, and his decision not to file criminal charges.

Robert Hur's testimony before a congressional committee quickly turned into a partisan slugfest with Democrats and Republicans seizing on the contrasting behavior of Biden and Donald Trump, who has been indicted for his own mishandling of top-secret documents.

Hur said criminal charges against Biden were not warranted and, in a politically explosive section, described him as "a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory".

Republicans have focused on Hur's comments about Biden's memory, hoping to reignite the age issue for the 81-year-old Democrat ahead of the rematch against 77-year-old Republican Trump.

"My task was to determine whether the president retained or disclosed national defense information 'willfully', meaning, knowingly and with the intent to do something the law forbids," Hur told the House Judiciary Committee. "For that reason, I had to consider the president's memory and overall mental state.

Democratic lawmakers pushed back against Hur, a Republican who served as a US attorney under Trump, accusing him of making "gratuitous" remarks about Biden's memory and injecting himself into the presidential campaign.

"Despite clearing President Biden from being prosecuted, you used your report to trash and smear President Biden," said Georgia Democrat Hank Johnson.

Hur, who was named special counsel by Biden's attorney general, Merrick Garland, insisted "partisan politics had no place" in his work.

Representative Matt Gaetz and other Republicans contrasted the decision not to charge Biden with the indictment of Trump.

Trump has been charged in Florida by another special counsel, Jack Smith, with hoarding classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago home after leaving the White House and obstructing the efforts of the FBI to retrieve them.

"Biden and Trump should have been treated equally," Gaetz said. "They weren't."

Agencies via Xinhua