The Biden White House is proclaiming a new prerogative for presidents: They may suppress any evidence of their unfitness for office. The battle over five hours of audio tapes could settle President Biden’s fate or pave the way for perpetual presidential secrecy in coming years.

In August 2022, Biden’s FBI launched a massive, heavily-publicized raid on Trump’s Mar-a-Lago headquarters to seize classified documents that the former president allegedly illegally possessed. After classified documents were also discovered in several of President Biden’s homes and offices, Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed Special Counsel Robert Hur to investigate.

Hur interviewed Biden last October and released a report in January stating that the president had knowingly violated federal law. But Hur recommended no prosecution because jurors would see Biden as an “elderly man with a poor memory.” The White House vehemently attacked Hur for that statement yet refused to disclose the audio files that could settle the controversy.

Three months ago, the official White House spokesman for oversight and obstruction — Ian “Baghdad Bob” Sams — boasted that Biden never asserted executive privilege during the Hur investigation because he “was transparent and he had nothing to hide.” Except for his mumbling and maundering?

Last month, the Justice Department claimed that disclosing those audio tapes would be a “clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy.” But Biden was not conscripted into the presidency and no one forced him to illegally retain classified documents scattered over sites in multiple states.

Congressional Republicans threatened to hold Attorney General Merrick Garland in contempt for refusing to disclose the audio tapes. The White House on Thursday formally invoked executive privilege to block access to the tapes.

Biden is playing a “Get Out of Democracy Free” card.

Bad motives by Republicans justify the coverup, White House counsel Ed Siskel claims.

Siskel says that the GOP had “no legitimate need for the audio recordings” — as if everyone is obliged to take the White House’s word that Biden is the smartest man in Washington.

Siskel asserted that if Republicans received the audio files, they would “chop them up, distort them, and use them for partisan political purposes” and “manipulate them for potential political gain is inappropriate.”

“Chopped?!?” Will Biden’s Brain Trust propose revising the First Amendment to prohibit any editing of politicians’ statements?

Does Siskel believe that the Biden re-election campaign deserves veto power over any outtake from the president?

The controversy is exposing Washingtonians’ self-worship. When a reporter asked Garland on Thursday morning why he asked Biden to declare executive privilege, Garland pompously responded, “The Justice Department is a fundamental institution of our democracy . . . I will protect this building and its people.”

Did Garland forget that his oath of office touted the Constitution, not 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue?

For the White House, the issue is not whether Biden is capable of fulfilling the heavy duties of his job.Instead, the issue is that the American people are unfit to judge the president’s verbal pratfalls and incoherence.

Instead of a bizarre executive privilege claim, the White House should have invoked the Americans with Disabilities Act and threatened to sue any voter for illegal prejudice against the mentally handicapped.

Are Americans heading for another “Alice in Wonderland” election — votes first, evidence later?

Will the Biden-Hur tapes become the 2024 equivalent of the coverup of Hunter Biden’s laptop in the 2020 election? Will there be any number on Cynics Bingo Card that won’t be covered by Election Day?