The Democratic National Committee has allocated a minimum of $1.7 million to law firms that represented President Biden during the investigation conducted by special counsel Robert Hur into his handling of classified documents. This information comes from federal spending disclosures.
Hur, in the end, decided not to pursue charges against the president. However, in a detailed report released earlier this year, he highlighted that Mr. Biden knowingly held onto and shared classified information even after his tenure as vice president concluded in 2017.
According to federal records, Bob Bauer PLLC received over $1 million from the committee between July 2023 and February of this year. Bauer, who previously served as the president’s personal attorney in the documents matter, was the recipient of these payments. Additionally, the records indicate that the committee made monthly payments of $100,000 to the law firm Hemenway and Barnes during a similar time frame. Axios was the first to report these payments on Friday.
Bauer and David Laufman, a former Justice Department official, accompanied the president during his interview with the special counsel in October 2023. Jennifer Miller, an attorney at Hemenway and Barnes, also formed part of the president’s personal legal team.
Bauer and Hemenway and Barnes, who had previously provided legal services to the DNC, declined to comment on the Justice Department probe into Mr. Biden’s handling of classified documents, which began in late 2022. A spokesperson for Bauer also refrained from making a statement.
Both President Biden and former President Trump are utilizing political donations to cover their legal fees and entanglements, although the expenses incurred by Mr. Trump far exceed those of Mr. Biden.
Recently, Mr. Biden’s reelection campaign expressed their disapproval of Trump’s reliance on politically allied groups to pay for attorneys’ fees. The Biden campaign issued a press release to emphasize their financial advantage over Trump and to draw attention to the fact that organizations supporting Trump have spent millions of dollars on his legal defense.
According to a statement from Alex Floyd, a spokesperson for the DNC, he emphasizes that there is no comparison between the payments made by the DNC to the president’s attorneys and Trump’s actions of soliciting donations for his legal issues.
According to Floyd, the DNC does not use any of the money donated by grassroots supporters to cover legal expenses. In contrast, Donald Trump actively seeks legal fees from his supporters and depletes every available source of funds as if it were his personal piggy bank.
CBS News reached out to the Democratic National Committee and representatives for the president and his legal team in January 2023 to inquire about the source of the funds for covering Mr. Biden’s legal expenses.
No one would give a direct response.
“It’s his private attorney, so I would leave it at that,” remarked White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre in response to a question regarding the President’s legal counsel.
