The Naked Careerism of Robert Hur
Until he stuck his head out with his report on Joe Biden, Special Counsel Robert Hur was just another Washington lawyer with stellar credentials. Now, he’s flashing brightly on Trump’s radar.
Whether you’re a fan or foe of Joe Biden, I think we should all be chagrined by the way Special Counsel Robert Hur treated the president in his recently released report by the Justice Department.
The headline should have been the report's conclusion—that after an exhaustive investigation, Biden won’t be facing criminal charges for improperly retaining classified information. Instead, that key point was buried by Hur’s comments about Biden’s memory problems.
The report stated that Biden’s memory “appeared to have significant limitations.” Hur suggested that it’d be futile to prosecute Biden because he’s so feeble that jurors would exonerate him out of pity:
We have also considered that, at trial, Mr. Biden would likely present himself to a jury, as he did during our interview of him, as a sympathetic, well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory.
Sadism with a Touch of Warmth
What’s insidious is that Hur disguised the meanness of his words by coating them in a veneer of softness. His description of Biden as a “well-meaning, elderly man” sounds like the observations of a bystander who’s charmed by the grandpa roaming aimlessly in the neighborhood. Except, of course, Hur is no mere observer.
Hur wasn’t just condescending; he was cruel. Most low of all is his decision to highlight Biden’s failure to recall the date of his son’s death. “He did not remember, even within several years, when his son Beau died,” Hur wrote in his report.
How is that adding to anything? Hur’s already larded his report with examples of Biden’s faulty memory so why throw in this particular lapse that’s bound to cause additional pain? It’s humiliation made extra sharp with a direct jab at an open wound. Frankly, it seemed sadistic.
As special counsel, Hur was not tasked with diagnosing Biden’s—or anyone else’s—mental or physical condition. Nor was he qualified to do so. Yet there he was playing doctor: geriatrician, neurologist, and psychiatrist. You could also throw in a jury consultant and opinion writer, while you’re at it.
Even some on the right believe that Hur went too far. “I think it's outrageous,” Mark Lytle, a partner at Nixon Peabody and former member of the White House Counsel's Office in the Trump administration, told U.S.A Today. “Prosecutors are taught that the Department of Justice should speak through charges or it shouldn't speak at all.”
A Tiger Mom’s Dream
Until now, Hur hewed to the script. A Tiger Mom’s dream, Hur was a star student (Harvard undergrad, then Stanford Law School where he served on the law review), followed by clerkships with Judge Alex Kozinski of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and Supreme Court Chief Justice William Rehnquist. A former partner at Gibson Dunn and King & Spalding, Hur was nominated by Trump in 2017 to be U.S. attorney for Maryland. Last year, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed Hur as special counsel, citing his “long and distinguished career as a prosecutor.” (Garland also made the comment, now ironic: “I am confident that Mr. Hur will carry out his responsibility in an even-handed and urgent manner, and in accordance with the highest traditions of this Department.”)
No Alina Habba is he. Yet, like Habba, Hur is strutting his stuff, but with far more polish.
It’s all so predictable. Like an increasing number of ambitious lawyers and politicians in the Republican universe, Hur seems to be performing for Donald Trump. And there’s no better way to get Trump’s attention than by proactively doing his bidding—in this case, amplifying the narrative that Biden is a doddering old fool who shouldn’t be president. Indeed, every quote about Biden’s memory lapse in the report could be used in Trump’s campaign ads—and probably will be.
I don’t know what Hur’s ambitions are—federal judgeship, U.S. Attorney General, or the Supreme Court (expectations are running high that the next justice will be an Asian American since there hasn’t been one)—but I’m betting that he has an agenda. Until he stuck his head out with this report, he was just another Washington lawyer with stellar credentials. Now, he’s flashing brightly on Trump’s radar.
So let me nominate Robert Hur for the careerist award. What he did to Biden was mean and cheap. Didn’t anyone tell him that it’s not nice to throw a “well-meaning, elderly man” under the bus?
Contact: chen.vivia@gmail.com
Photo: Wikipedia