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Delaware Supreme Court Questions University Of Delaware’s Refusal To Release Biden Senate Docs

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Delaware Supreme Court justices heavily questioned the University of Delaware’s rationale for refusing to release President Joe Biden’s Senate papers during oral arguments Wednesday.

The Daily Caller News Foundation and Judicial Watch filed an appeal with the Delaware Supreme Court in January after the Superior Court held that the university had satisfied the burden of proof needed to justify denying the records, along with related communications and agreements, which they had requested in 2020. During Wednesday’s hearing, Justice Abigail Legrow pushed back on the university’s argument by reading part of the Supreme Court’s prior opinion, which she noted “seems to say something else.”

“Unless it is clear on the face of the request that the requested records are not subject to FOIA, the public body must search for responsive records,” the decision said, requiring the university to create a document that would allow the Superior Court to determine on remand whether it “performed an adequate search.”

“You didn’t perform a search,” she said. “How can this Court ever conclude that what you did is consistent with this prior decision?”

Halloran Farkas + Kittila LLP partner Bill Green, who represented the DCNF and Judicial Watch, argued that the university made a “categorical determination” that the gift agreement and communication records did not use public funds without conducting a search of the requested material.

Additionally, Green argued that the affidavit filed by the university stating public funds were not used to maintain the documents was based on hearsay.

Legal counsel representing the university told the Court that it can determine whether public funds were used to support Biden’s papers without looking at the records, as long as it knows no state funds were used.

“As we argued today, the Biden Documents housed at the University of Delaware are of significant public interest,” said Michael Bekesha, senior attorney at Judicial Watch. “We have asked the Delaware Supreme Court to require the University of Delaware to comply with the law. To date, we do not believe it has. We are hopeful the Court will agree.”

“The public has a right to know who is paying for the Biden Documents and how they are being kept,” Bekesha added.

The records have been housed at the University of Delaware Library since 2012, when Biden provided them with the understanding that they would not be publicly released until “they have been properly processed and archived,” according to the university’s website.

Information contained in the records could relate to Tara Reade, who accused Biden of sexually assaulting her while working in his senate office in 1993, or the president’s son, Hunter Biden, who is under investigation for alleged failure to pay taxes and lying on a federal firearms form.

The FBI searched the university twice earlier this year in relation to its investigation into President Biden’s handling of classified documents.

“The Biden papers are of incredible public interest,” Green told the Court. “We just need to know if state funds are used and how they were funded. It seems implausible that the gift agreement does not relate to the expenditure of state funds.”