Forget the Autopen. The Question Is Forgery.
Did persons in the White House use the autopen to forge President Biden’s signature?
by John B. Daukas
July 28, 2025, 10:04 PM
Much ink has been spilled on the topic of whether use of the autopen to sign President Joe Biden’s name to pardons, executive orders, legislation, and other documents invalidates the actions. But these analyses overly complicate and miss the key point: Was the document a forgery?
Many presidential acts, such as approving legislation, require a signed document to be effective. In 2005, the United States Department of Justice Office of Legal Counsel opined: “The President need not personally perform the physical act of affixing his signature to a bill he approves and decides to sign in order for the bill to become law. Rather, the President may sign a bill within the meaning of Article I, Section 7 [of the Constitution] by directing a subordinate to affix the President’s signature to such a bill, for example by autopen.”
Signing a piece of paper is not exercise of the power granted to the president; the signature is merely the manifestation and evidence that the president has exercised his power to take an action. No one would claim a president who broke his hand had to abdicate the presidency because he no longer could himself physically sign documents. The question, therefore, is not how the signature ended up on the page, but whether the president himself took the action evidenced by the signature and directed that the document be signed.
The Constitution grants certain powers, including the pardon power, exclusively to the president. All would agree that if a White House staffer typed up a “pardon” without the president’s knowledge — or with the knowledge of a president who lacked the mental capacity to understand the nature and import of such a document — and then forged the president’s signature thereto, the pardon unquestionably would be invalid. Use of the autopen is simply the mechanism by which the document was signed. The question remains whether the president was aware of its use and had the mental capacity to agree to the challenged act. So, the simpler way to frame the issue is: “Was this a forgery?”
more
https://spectator.org/forget-the-autopen-the-question-is-forgery/
