Joe Biden’s Senate records could answer questions about his past actions — but they’re being kept secretMSN, Jul 11, 2019, Washington Post
Joe Biden’s effort to make his lengthy experience the central issue of his campaign has been confounded by questions about his actions during almost four decades as a U.S. senator, on issues including criminal justice, busing and the hearings into the nomination of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.
Those questions might be answered in the massive trove of Senate records he donated eight years ago to the University of Delaware under an agreement that they could be made public by early this year.
But the records are being kept secret, following a new directive posted on the university’s website just before Biden made his presidential campaign official in April.
Biden has sought to blunt criticism of his past actions by putting the most positive spin on them, but the limited availability of documents from his 36-year Senate career complicates a full evaluation of his record.
The collection of documents that Biden donated to his alma mater fills 1,875 boxes and also includes 415 gigabytes of electronic records. It includes committee reports, drafts of legislation and correspondence.
At the time of the donation, the university’s then-president Patrick Harker thanked Biden for providing “an abundance of materials that will illuminate decades of U.S. policy and diplomacy and the vice president’s critical role in its development.â€
Starting in 2011 and for years after, the university had described the terms of the agreement as keeping the papers sealed “for two years after Biden retires from public office.†But this year, on the day before Biden announced his presidential campaign, the university changed the way that it described those terms.
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