Washington — Bob Bauer, personal counsel to President Biden, said Sunday that the recent report by special counsel Robert Hur about the president's handling of classified documents "went off the rails," amid sharp criticism of Mr. Biden in the days since the special counsel's assessment was issued for descriptions of his memory detailed within the report. 

"It's a shabby piece of work," Bauer said on "Face the Nation." Bauer noted that he believed the special counsel had "arrived at the right legal conclusion" before pages later making "misstatements of facts and totally inappropriate and pejorative comments that are unfounded and not supported by the record."

• Transcript: Bob Bauer, former Obama White House counsel, on "Face the Nation," Feb. 11, 2024

Bauer's comments on Sunday came after special counsel Robert Hur on Thursday issued his report on Mr. Biden's handling of classified documents during his time as vice president, which found that criminal charges were not warranted. But the report also featured several observations about Mr. Biden's memory that have dominated headlines and become fodder for GOP opposition in recent days.  

The report highlighted that the president's memory "appeared to have significant limitations," leading the special counsel's team to believe a jury might see Mr. Biden as a "well-meaning, elderly man with a poor memory." It also alleged that Mr. Biden could not recall the year his son died and when he served as vice president, among other incidents. 

The White House counsel's office has asked the special counsel to revise some of the language in the report while attorneys called the descriptions of the president's memory "inflammatory." The characterization of the 81-year-old president's memory has threatened to become politically damaging amid his reelection campaign. 

Bauer criticized the report, which he called a "shoddy work product" on Sunday, claiming that outside of the legal analysis, there were allegedly misstatements of fact and commentary that he said were "totally inappropriate."

"The special counsel's decision to cherry pick in a very misleading way some of the references that we're discussing here is an example of what I call a really shabby work product and completely out of bounds for a prosecutor," Bauer said. 

CBS News has contacted the special counsel's team for comment on Bauer's remarks.     

The president criticized the report's assessment of his memory on Thursday, saying that "my memory is fine" and adding that "I'm well-meaning and I'm an elderly man and I know what the hell I'm doing."

"I'm the president, and I put this country back on its feet," Mr. Biden said. 

Kaia Hubbard

Kaia Hubbard is a politics reporter for CBS News Digital based in Washington, D.C.

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