White House fires back at special counsel report, Harris calls descriptions 'politically motivated'

Less than 24 hours after the release of a harsh report from special counsel Robert Hur that concluded President Joe Biden would not face charges over his handling of classified documents but cast doubt on his mental fitness, the White House fired back Friday.

President Biden, who lashed out at Hur's comments about his memory when it came to his son Beau's death in his own news conference on Thursday night, didn't take additional questions when he met Friday afternoon with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in the Oval Office.

But Vice President Kamala Harris and the White House stepped in to criticize what they called the special counsel's «gratuitous» statements, taking issue not only with Hur's description of Biden's mental acuity but also some of his critical findings that Biden willfully retained and shared classified information.

Harris told ABC News Senior White House Correspondent Selina Wang that, as a former prosecutor, she believed the depictions of Biden included in the report were «inaccurate and inappropriate.»

«The way that the president's demeanor in that report was characterized could not be more wrong on the facts and clearly, politically motivated, gratuitous,» Harris said.

Hitting Hur even harder, Harris continued, «When it comes to the role and responsibility of a prosecutor in a situation like that, we should expect that there will be a higher level of integrity than what we saw.»

At the daily press briefing Friday, White House Counsel's Office spokesman Ian Sams said he found Harris' remarks «very powerful» as he suggested Hur may have felt political pressure to criticize the president.

«There's an environment that we are in that generates a ton of pressure because you have congressional Republicans, other