Joe Biden has hit out at claims he forgot when his son Beau died in a surprise speech at the White House.
The US President gave the unexpected announcement at 12.45am GMT (7.45pm EST).
It comes after a report from Special Counsel Robert Hur found evidence President Biden “willfully” retained highly classified materials when he was a private citizen but that no criminal charges are warranted for him or anyone else.
The report said Biden’s memory faced “significant limitations” which left the President “struggling to remember events,” including what years he was Vice President or when his son Beau died. The President’s late son died of brain cancer in 2015.
Reacting to the report, the President told the nation: “There is even reference that I don’t remember when my son died. How in the hell dare he raise that?
“Frankly when I was asked the question I thought to myself ‘wasn’t any of their damn business.’
“Let me tell you something. Some of you have commented. I where since the day he died – every single day – the rosary [bracelet] he got.
“Every Memorial Day we hold a service remembering him attended by friends and family and people who loved him.
“I don’t need anyone to remind me of when he passed away.”
The findings released on Thursday will make it more difficult for Biden to draw contrast with Donald Trump, his likely opponent in November’s presidential election, over a criminal indictment accusing the former president of illegally hoarding classified records at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida.
Despite abundant differences between the cases, Trump immediately seized on the special counsel report to portray himself as a victim of a “two-tiered system of justice.”
Special counsel Hur found evidence that Biden willfully held onto highly classified information, but his report explained why he did not believe the evidence met the standard for criminal charges.
This included a high probability that the Justice Department would not be able to prove Biden’s intent beyond a reasonable doubt, citing among other things an advanced age that they said made him forgetful and the possibility of “innocent explanations” for the records that they could not refute.
