Biden Rebuffed by Senate on Releasing Files After Assault Claim

(Bloomberg) -- The secretary of the Senate said Monday her office cannot release any personnel records, which would include any complaint that Tara Reade filed related to her allegation that Joe Biden sexually assaulted her.

Biden, the presumptive Democratic nominee, wrote a letter to the secretary of the Senate on Friday, instructing her to release any documentation related to Reade's assertion that Biden sexually harassed and assaulted her when she worked as an aide in his Senate office. Biden has denied the allegations and asked the Senate to “make public the results of this search.”

Senate Secretary Julie Adams's office said in a statement that privacy laws prevent her from releasing any such documents.

“Senate Legal Counsel advises that the secretary has no discretion to disclose any such information as requested in Vice President Biden's letter of May 1,” the office said in the statement.

Biden campaign lawyer Bob Bauer, a former White House counsel, responded to the letter by asking whether “just existence of any such records” is “subject to the same prohibition on disclosure.”

Bauer also asked if someone such as a complainant could seek to have the records disclosed, and whether the Senate could release the procedures and other related materials that the Office of Senate Fair Employment Practices would have used to process a complaint in 1993.

Earlier: Biden Denial of Sex-Assault Claim Bogs Down on Records

The secretary's office responded late Monday, saying it was prohibited from disclosing even the existence of any such records and it was unaware of any exceptions that would allow specific individuals, including the person who may have filed a complaint, from receiving these kind of records.

Reade said in March that when she was an aide in Biden's Senate office in 1993, he pushed her against a wall in a Senate office building, put his hand up her skirt and sexually assaulted her with his fingers.

Reade said she made a formal harassment complaint to what was then called the Office of Fair Employment Practices in the Senate but does not have a copy of the document. She said the complaint was about Biden making her feel uncomfortable and that it didn't mention sexual assault.

After weeks of silence around the allegations, Biden Friday denied the claims and called on the National Archives to release any documentation, as the former vice president insisted any personnel records would be kept there. After a spokesman for the archives said those records would have remained in the Senate, Biden wrote Adams asking her to search for them.

Reade has called on Biden to release the records that she says are being held at the University of Delaware, but Biden has said those records do not include any personnel files. Those records are sealed until two years after Biden retires from public life.

Reade's allegations have tested the Democratic Party, as it wrestles to find a balance between its support for Biden and the #MeToo movement's imperative to believe women who accuse powerful men of abuse.

Democratic leaders have supported Biden since the allegations surfaced, but some rank-and-file Democrats have become uneasy. Still, many Democrats have pointed to Donald Trump's numerous sexual assault allegations, most of which he has not addressed, and applauded Biden for his transparency.