Legal scholar Jonathan Turley has warned that it is very unlikely that former President Joe Biden’s presidential pardons will be overturned due to an autopen signature.
It comes amid growing concerns about presidential documents being signed by White House handlers using an autopen while Biden was in a cognitively diminished state.
Autopen signatures are automatically produced by a machine, as opposed to an authentic, handwritten autograph.
The use of an autopen means documents could have been signed without Biden being present, or even aware, as his signature was applied.
The scandal has led to speculation that important documents signed with an autopen, such as Biden’s final hour pardons, could be overturned.
However, Turley, a professor at George Washington University Law School, warned that the chances of overturning executive orders due to the use of autopen are “vanishingly low.”
In a post on X, Turley wrote:
“Many are suggesting that the Biden pardons may now be challenged in light of the disclosures of Biden’s use of an autopen.
“The chances of such challenges succeeding are vanishingly low.
“Presidents are allowed to use the autopen and courts will not presume a dead-hand conspiracy.”
“Many of these were high-profile pardons, including for his own son, that Biden acknowledged publicly,” he added.
“There is also a problem with standing unless the issue comes up in a government effort to indict a recipient.
“That does not mean that the disclosures are not deeply troubling.”
President Donald Trump has been sounding the alarm on Biden’s prevalent use of an autopen for official presidential documents.
Most notably, Biden’s autopen signature was used for official presidential pardons before he left office in January.
On Monday morning, the president posted on Truth Social that Biden’s pardons for individuals connected to the Democrats’ anti-Trump Jan. 6 Select Committee “investigation” are “void.”
“The ‘Pardons’ that Sleepy Joe Biden gave to the Unselect Committee of Political Thugs, and many others, are hereby declared VOID, VACANT, AND OF NO FURTHER FORCE OR EFFECT, because of the fact that they were done by Autopen,” Trump wrote.
“In other words, Joe Biden did not sign them but, more importantly, he did not know anything about them!
“The necessary Pardoning Documents were not explained to, or approved by, Biden.
“He knew nothing about them, and the people that did may have committed a crime.
“Therefore, those on the Unselect Committee, who destroyed and deleted ALL evidence obtained during their two-year Witch Hunt of me, and many other innocent people, should fully understand that they are subject to investigation at the highest level,” he added.
At the heart of the issue over the use of an autopen is concern over Biden’s mental acuity when he served in the White House.
Trump said Sunday that though he uses the autopen for documents such as letters, he does not use an autopen for legally binding documents.
The president’s declaration that Biden’s pardons are now “void” sparked a wave of legal questions to swirl.
Many legal experts are reporting that this is uncharted legal territory.
“This dog will not hunt,” Turley added on X.
“It may be worthy of investigation by Congress, but the pardons are unlikely to be seriously questioned by the courts.”
The Heritage Foundation’s Oversight Project first sounded the alarm on Biden’s use of an autopen earlier in March.
The legal watchdog reported that an autopen signature was used on the vast majority of official documents researchers reviewed.
The exception was for the signature on Biden’s official announcement that he was dropping out of the presidential race in 2024.
At the time, Biden’s signature on his dropping out letter was so different that many questioned whether he had signed it himself.
Heritage’s Project Oversight posted a memo on its ongoing investigation into the matter Monday.
The organization reported that researchers are wading through copious amounts of “public documents discharging non-delegable Presidential powers containing former President Joseph R. Biden’s signature.”
The memo determined that “individuals in the Biden Administration other than the President appear to have used a device called an autopen to affix the President’s signature onto some of the most controversial clemency warrants of his Presidency.”
The Project Oversight memo offered a legal explanation that “if President Biden’s non-delegable official actions were not his own, then they are invalid.”
“Start with the Constitution,” the memo reported.
“Multiple Constitutional provisions, like the pardon power, vest those powers solely in the President.
“In those cases, the President affixing his signature is his execution of the acts as President.”
“The Founding Fathers contemplated these issues when writing the Constitution,” the legal explanation continued.
“For example, Article I, Section 7, Clause 2 of the Constitution lays out the role of the President to sign or veto legislation.
“Early debates at the Constitutional Convention concerning this provision made it clear that regardless of the structure of the Executive Branch, the President would maintain a necessary affirmative approbation of legislation presented to him.
“The act of the President affixing his signature manually to a bill is his consent and is the very act that causes a bill to become law; it is in no way ministerial.
“Until he signs, there is no law.”
In 2005, under former President George W. Bush’s administration, the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel determined that the president is permitted to use an autopen to sign bills into law.
“You have asked whether, having decided to approve a bill, the President may sign it, within the meaning of Article I, Section 7 of the Constitution, by directing a subordinate to affix the President’s signature to it, for example by autopen,” the opinion stated.
“This memorandum confirms and elaborates upon our earlier advice that the President may sign a bill in this manner.”
The Project Oversight memo, however, hit back that the opinion is “wrong.”
“This opinion is wrong,” the memo said.
“But even that erroneous opinion was clear that ‘(w)e emphasize that we are not suggesting that the President may delegate the decision to approve and sign a bill, only that, having made this decision, he may direct a subordinate to affix the President’s signature to the bill.’”
During Monday’s media briefing, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt was peppered with questions about the autopen.
Leavitt raised the question of whether Biden was aware of the pardons when they were signed.
“Was his illegal signature used without his consent or knowledge?” Leavitt said on Monday.
“And that’s not just the president or me raising those questions.
“According to the New York Post, there are Biden officials from the previous White House who raised those questions and wondered if the president was even consulted about his legally binding signature being signed onto documents.”
“And so I think it’s a question that everybody in this room should be looking into because certainly that would propose, perhaps criminal or illegal behavior if staff members were signing the president of the United States’ autograph without his consent,” Leavitt continued.
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) also recounted earlier in January that Biden reportedly didn’t remember signing an executive order freezing new liquid natural gas exports in 2024.
Biden’s lack of awareness regarding the order increased scrutiny surrounding his mental acuity.
“I didn’t do that,” the former president said in 2024, Johnson recounted during an interview with the Free Press’ Bari Weiss in January.
“Sir, you paused it, I know,” Johnson said he told the president at the time.
“I have the export terminals in my state.
“I talked to those people in my state, I’ve talked to those people this morning, this is doing massive damage to our economy, national security.”
“I walked out of that meeting with fear and loathing because I thought, ‘We are in serious trouble — who is running the country?’” Johnson said of the 2024 meeting.
“Like, I don’t know who put the paper in front of him, but he didn’t know,” he added.
Turley said Johnson’s comments on Biden suggest the “use of dead-hand power.”
However, Turley warns that legally pursuing a challenge would likely be a non-starter.
“The account of Speaker Johnson on how Biden seemed unaware of signing a major piece of legislation does suggest the use of a dead-hand power by staffers,” Turley wrote.
“In the end, this is the most difficult type of allegation to pursue since the key parties will be unified in claiming full knowledge and approval by the president.”
READ MORE – Adam Kinzinger Melts Down After Trump Declares Biden’s Jan 6 Committee Pardons ‘VOID’
