The manner in which Biden family pets have been raised and handled during the president's tenure in the Oval Office has been the subject of much discussion in recent months, and a new revelation has only added to the controversy.

According to the Daily Mail, the U.S. Secret destroyed footage said to have captured an incident in which Joe Biden's German shepherd, Commander, bit an agent so severely that White House tours had to be halted so that the bloody scene could be remediated.

FOIA request yields unsettling discovery

It was back in March that the Mail lodged a Freedom of Information Act request for video of the June 15, 2023, incident, footage that had been referenced by an agency email detailing what occurred with Commander.

The video in question was said to show the president's canine companion darting toward a Secret Service agent and jumping in his direction while in the Kennedy Garden of the East Wing.

That account of the attack noted that the agent sustained a “deep bite” on his arm that necessitated stitches.

According to the email communication, tours of the East Wing had to be stopped for a period of time so that blood from the dog bite could be cleaned from the floors in an indoor area adjacent to the garden.

Footage deleted

However, in response to the attempt by the Mail to secure the aforementioned footage, the agency offered what some believe was a curious – and unsettling – response, with Kevin Tyrrell, a FOIA officer with the federal agency, writing to the outlet that “Due to Secret Service retention standards, the above mentioned file(s) has been destroyed.”

In a subsequent back-and-forth between the Mail and agency spokesperson Anthony Guglielmi, the latter asserted that the Secret Service follows the “federal records retention schedule that defines when certain types of records can be archived, destroyed, etc.”

Though Guglielmi disclaimed having any knowledge of the specific footage sought by the Mail, he noted, “I am assuming the record in question is no longer available because of the expiration of record retention.”

Disturbing history emerges

As the Mail explains, there have reportedly been upwards of 25 incidents of aggressive behavior from Commander towards others at the White House and elsewhere, with another of the family's pets -- a different German shepherd called Major -- having engaged in similar behavior.

The New York Post noted late last year that conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch has also solicited records regarding the Bidens' dogs, with the organization's president, Tom Fitton, stating, “It is beyond belief that, even after Judicial Watch exposed their dog attacking 10 Secret Service personnel, Joe and Jill Biden have continued to let their dog menace and attack Secret Service and White House staff.”

Fitton went on, “The ongoing Biden administration cover-up of the Biden dog attacks on Secret Service agents is dangerous corruption,” adding that there had been a real risk that someone on the president's security detail could be severely maimed or even killed as a result.

Perhaps in response to the growing scrutiny of the situation, Commander -- as Major had been before him -- was ultimately sent to live elsewhere last fall after ongoing attempts at behavioral correction proved unsuccessful.

Though the Bidens' decisions to rehome the dangerous dogs -- overdue and seemingly reluctant as they were -- may have been steps in the right direction, the Secret Service decision to destroy the footage of one of Commander's particularly egregious attacks only serves to bolster speculation that an unseemly cover-up took place for the president's benefit.