When the Heritage Foundation’s Oversight Project offered its report on the Biden Administration’s use of the presidential “autopen,” in March, the legality of many of President Joe Biden’s signatures were placed in jeopardy.
Since then, Republicans in Congress and Trump in the White House have been pushing the case that White House staff often used the autopen sometimes without the presidential awareness.
Since then, Republicans in Congress and President Trump have been pushing the case that White House staff often used the autopen and sometimes without presidential awareness.
If so, with the non-stroke of a non-pen, could much of what came out of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue for four years be un-done?
“The full picture of what Mr. Biden did on pardon and clemency decisions,” the New York Times explains, “and how much he directed those decisions and the actions of his staff, including the use of the autopen, may come down to tens of thousands of Biden White House emails that the National Archives has turned over as part of the investigation by the Trump White House and the Justice Department.”
Times reporters investigated some of the emails, offering a tentative-if-predictable conclusion: “the Biden White House had a process to establish that Mr. Biden had orally made decisions in meetings before the staff secretary, Stefanie Feldman, who managed use of the autopen, would have clemency records put through the signing device.”
And of course Biden himself defends the integrity of his administration: “Let me be clear: I made the decisions during my presidency.
“I made the decisions about the pardons, executive orders, legislation and proclamations.”
Trust him!
The Times has been working to encourage us to trust the ex-president. Its March article, “How an Autopen Conspiracy Theory About Biden Went Viral,” clearly shows its bias — a context piece before any real investigation.
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10 replies on “The Autopen Question”
We may be sure de dicto that the autopen was used without proper Presidential authorization; but in some and perhaps in all cases, we shall never be sure de re; and, at the same time, we are not sure de re that the autopen was not used with proper authorization.
Ultimately, the proper standard is that, if the state is to take action against someone, the proof of the authorization of that action must be beyond a reasonable doubt.
Practically, what all this means is that, so long as it is plausible that the Duffer-in-Chief authorized a pardon or commutation, that pardon or commutation must be treated as authorized. But what it also means is that Executive Orders and the like for actions against persons are null-and-void if it is plausible that the President did not authorize them.
Th’ Fauch is gonna skate, at least as far as Federal prosecution is concerned. Noticeably, the Republican-controlled Congress has yet to compel him to testify, though his pardon legally stript himof his right to refuse.
How long, I wonder, did it take for President Donald Trump to hand-sign all those COVID-19 “stimulus” checks that he was very insistent go out with his signature, and no other, on them?
Wait … he didn’t hand-sign them? Does that mean his signature was forged? If so, getting all that money back and punishing the forgers will probably be quite a project!
I’m personally in favor of requiring hand-written signatures on any and all instruments uttered by officers or employees of the federal government, including the president, if for no other reason than it will reduce the number of such instruments.
But absent such a requirement in law, the time to challenge a presidential signature on the basis of that president’s competence, etc. is when the document bearing the signature is promulgated. And the time to take down a president and his actions over competence issues is when he’s president. The 25th Amendment doesn’t provide for retroactive removal of the current president’s predecessor.
Your “etc.” slurs-over discovery that some of the orders signed by autopen may not have been Presidentially authorized at all, which discovery is more recent and entails a very different question from whether an authorization were incompetent. A challenge long after discovery would be untimely. But we are not long after discovery; we are not even long after some of the possible unauthorized use may have occurred.
The explanation of how members of the Biden Administration engaged in unauthorized use of the autopen entails various elements, some known since the dawn of humankind, others more recent. The former do not render challenges to directives untimely.
Incompetent to stand trial is incompetent to sign pardons.
Or legislation.
Which makes it even more complicated.
Where the EOs and legislation are concerned, I’m not sure how to address them. The pardons are another matter. I’ve read two different articles on whether or not they can be reversed. If the pardon has been accepted, then I don’t see how it can be reversed. Presidential pardons weren’t always signed. Also the president has plenary pardon power. What was done cannot be undone. Going forward, perhaps there should be an agreement on when and in what situations the autopen can be used.
Good points.
What a stupid column! Remember when the LIAR Trump claimed he declassified the classified documents. THAT was a lie!! But you didn’t care about that!
Pam, the law that authorizes the President to declassify documents does not specify a procedure nor a meta-procedure. Thus, while a standard procedure had been in-place, the President was not bound to follow it in declassifying documents. Every claim that I’ve encountered against Trump in this case has mistakenly or dishonestly presumed that standard procedure was legally binding.
Can you offer something better than bald claims and insults?
Another censored message?
Pam, you repeatedly claim that your comments have been censored, though each time someone explains to you that the ‘blog is not continuously monitored and that comments wait in the moderation queue until an administrator ensures that they are not spam.
Some of my comments have idled in the moderation queue for the better part of a day; you start crying censorship in less than two-and-a-half hours.
Your fulminations are not something that your opponents would want to censor. Your arguments are merely weak, but a source of embarrassment to other members in your tribe.