WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump alleged Thursday that officials in Joe Biden ‘s administration might have in effect forged their boss’s signature and taken broad actions he wasn’t aware of — while acknowledging he had no evidence that actually happened.
Meeting in the Oval Office with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, Trump repeated his long-standing allegations that the Biden White House relied on an autopen to sign presidential pardons, executive orders and other key documents, and said that cast doubt on their validity.
“Essentially, whoever used the autopen was the president,” Trump said. “And that is wrong. It’s illegal, it’s so bad and it’s so disrespectful to our country.”
Trump went on to suggest that rogue elements within Biden’s administration were faking his signature and governing without his knowledge, pushing the administration farther to the left than the president himself would have gone.
“He didn’t have much of an idea what was going on,” Trump said.
But pressed by reporters on whether he had evidence of specific items that were signed without Biden’s knowledge, or by others in the administration acting illegally, Trump responded, “No. But I’ve uncovered, you know, the human mind.”
He referenced the disastrous debate performance that forced Biden to abandon his reelection bid last summer and said, “I was in a debate with the human mind and I didn’t think he knew what the hell he was doing.”
Biden, in a statement Wednesday night, rejected any suggestion actions were taken without his knowledge, saying, “Let me be clear: I made the decisions during my presidency. I made the decisions about the pardons, executive orders, legislation, and proclamations. Any suggestion that I didn’t is ridiculous and false.”
That came after Trump directed his administration to investigate Biden’s actions as president, alleging aides masked his predecessor’s “cognitive decline” and suggesting that the use of the autopen undermines scores of his actions.
The president directed Attorney General Pam Bondi and White House counsel David Warrington to handle the investigation, a significant escalation in Trump’s targeting of political adversaries that could lay the groundwork for arguments by Republicans that a range of Biden’s actions as president were invalid.
The Justice Department under Democratic and Republican administrations has recognized the use of an autopen to sign legislation and issue pardons for decades. Also, the president’s absolute pardon power is enshrined in the U.S. Constitution.
Trump’s intensifying allegations against Biden reflect his fixation with his predecessor, who defeated him in 2020.
Trump never conceded the 2020 election and continues to falsely claim it was rigged against him. Even on Thursday, Trump invoked his allegations about the 2020 election.
Trump frequently suggests that Biden was wrong to use an autopen, a mechanical device that replicates a person’s authentic signature. Trump said Thursday that he himself had used it, including as a way to save time when signing large numbers of letters from young people. Still, he argued that Biden’s use of it constituted “the biggest scandal, maybe in the last hundred years in this country.”
