The White House intends to analyze tens of thousands of documents to investigate the use of the so-called automatic signature pen by former US President Joe Biden to sign documents on his behalf, Fox News reported, citing its sources.
According to their information, the investigation is led by the White House Office of Legal Counsel, and officials are coordinating their actions with the Department of Justice. The National Archives and Records Administration has already transferred tens of thousands of documents related to the use of the pen to them for study. The White House expects to analyze up to a million documents, including official correspondence from the former administration, to determine whether security measures were taken to ensure the use of a pen.
“The White House is investigating when the former president gave the order and when he did not. The use of the automatic signature is only legal when the president has said he wants to do something or when his approval has been obtained“, an unnamed US official told the channel.“The Trump White House is committed to finding answers to the many questions the American people have about how things were done in the Biden White House“, White House press secretary Caroline Leavitt told Fox News. She noted that Biden, being the “most incompetent and corrupt president in the history of the country“, essentially “handed over presidential powers to the automatic signature“, which was controlled by White House staff.
Fox News recalls that the automatic signature is also found in the pardon orders issued at the end of Biden's presidential term. Of all these pardons, the former head of the US administration personally signed only one, which concerns his son Hunter.
Biden previously admitted in an interview with The New York Times that he used an automatic pen when signing pardon orders on his behalf, but stated that all pardon decisions were made personally by him and he had to resort to an automatic signature due to the large number of documents. The former president also said he made the decision to pardon his family members out of concern that Trump and his administration could prosecute them, which would result in having to pay additional legal fees.
On June 5, Trump ordered an investigation into his predecessor's health as head of state and his aides' use of a pen to sign documents. Trump had previously said that Biden's pardons of approximately 2,500 people, including his relatives, were not legally binding because they were signed in pen without the former president's knowledge.