The Biden Justice Department has quietly shut down a criminal investigation into President Joe Bidens unprecedented use of an autopen to issue thousands of presidential pardons, claiming there is no clear legal basis on which to bring charges.
According to Western Journal, Federal prosecutors in U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirros office are dropping a criminal probe into whether former President Joe Biden and his aides unlawfully used an autopen to issue pardons, sources told CBS News on Wednesday. The decision effectively concedes that while the conduct may be deeply troubling, existing statutes do not explicitly address a president delegating his constitutional authority to unelected staff via a mechanical signature device.
In essence, the Biden team appears to have pushed executive power into territory so brazen and so far outside historical norms that federal law has not yet caught up. Critics argue that this legal vacuum has allowed the administration to escape accountability for conduct that would have been unthinkable in prior presidencies.
The controversy centers on allegations that Biden aides used an autopen a machine that mechanically reproduces a persons signature to authorize thousands of pardons and executive orders without the presidents direct consent. This practice, conservatives contend, was used to mask Bidens declining mental acuity and to maintain the illusion of an engaged commander in chief.
During his time in office, Biden issued a record 4,245 pardons and commutations, according to Pew Research data. This staggering figure represents the highest total of any presidential administration in U.S. history, far outpacing his predecessors.
Of those actions, more than 50 percent were signed using an autopen, based on analysis by the Heritage Foundation. Such extensive reliance on a mechanical signature device raises profound constitutional questions about who was actually exercising presidential power.
An explosive, 100-page report released in October 2025 by the House Oversight Committee detailed how Bidens inner circle allegedly exercised presidential authority without his informed consent. The report concluded that this was done in large part to conceal his apparent cognitive decline from the American public.
Committee chairman James Comer said the Biden Autopen Presidency will go down as one of the biggest political scandals in U.S. history. Our report reveals how key aides colluded to mislead the public and the extraordinary measures they took to sustain the appearance of presidential authority as Bidens capacity to function independently diminished, Comer continued.
On that basis, Comer and other Republicans argue that any executive actions carried out through the autopen should be deemed invalid. If unelected staff were effectively wielding the powers of the presidency, they contend, then the constitutional chain of authority was broken.
Last summer, President Donald Trump ordered a formal investigation into who was truly running the country during Bidens tenure. His directive reflected a broader concern on the right that the United States had effectively been governed by staffers and bureaucrats rather than an elected president.
The combined nature of Bidens documented cognitive decline and the repeated use of an autopen raises serious concerns about the legitimacy of his actions, he said in his June 2025 memorandum. Trump has framed the issue not merely as a political scandal, but as a direct assault on the constitutional order.
Trump said Bidens appointments of 235 federal judges and his record-high criminal pardons are invalid because of his diminished mental capacity. Just two days before Christmas in 2024, Biden commuted the sentences of 37 of the 40 most vile and monstrous criminals on Federal death row, including several child killers and mass murderers, the 47th president said.
The authority to take these executive actions is constitutionally reserved for the President, yet the Biden White House used an autopen to execute the vast majority of Bidens executive actions, particularly during the second half of his Presidency. For many conservatives, this episode underscores how far the administrative state and partisan operatives are willing to go to preserve power, even at the expense of constitutional norms.
At this point, Trump supporters are accustomed to institutional roadblocks, as his America First agenda has been resisted and undermined by entrenched interests at nearly every level. Yet with three years remaining in his current term, Trump still has time to challenge this legacy, restore proper constitutional governance, and pursue policies aimed at renewing American strength and sovereignty.
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