James Morrow opinion: How Joe Biden’s autograph became a hot-button issue

Joe Biden’s signature, or apparent lack thereof, on key documents is set to come under scrutiny as his legacy collapses in a heap, writes James Morrow.

At least the former President was able to personally sign a condolence book for Queen Elizabeth II. Picture: Getty Images

Joe Biden is not going gentle into that good night.

Instead, he and his legacy are collapsing in a heap.

A little over a year after that catastrophic debate performance – the one where he came across addled, confused, and at one point enthusiastically shouted, “we finally beat Medicare!” – the entire Biden record has fallen under a cloud of suspicion.

At issue is whether or not he even legally signed key instruments of his presidency, or whether a device called an “autopen” was used with or without his knowledge to authorise pardons and sign executive orders.

When President Donald Trump first raised the idea that staffers may have hijacked the autopen – used to reproduce signatures – it seemed like an out-there conspiracy theory designed more as a way to capture the vibe of Biden’s rudderless presidency than a statement of actual fact.

US President Donald Trump suggested his predecessor’s signature may have been hijacked. Picture: AFP

Yet as the saying goes, today’s conspiracy theories are tomorrow’s coming attractions, and now the autopen issue has gotten an airing in the very anti-Trump, pro-Democrat New York Times.

In what can only be interpreted as an attempt to get their side of the story out before a looming Congressional investigation, on Monday the Times gave the Biden camp the chance to tell their side of the story.

What emerged was a somewhat confused narrative.

On the one hand, the former president said he was across every pardon and order signed.

Yet a closer read reveals that in many cases the president barely knew what was going on with many of the pardons, including incredibly troubling ones including grants of clemencies for Chinese spies and another Chinese student who had been caught with tens of thousands of child abuse images.

Joe Biden’s chief of staff Jeff Zients arrives for US President Joe Biden's the State of the Union address at the US Capitol in Washington, DC, on March 7, 2024. Picture: AFP

Biden’s chief of staff Jeff Zients personally signed off on pre-emptive pardons for a number of individuals including Dr Anthony Fauci and others, writing in an email at 10:31pm on January 19 (hours before Trump’s inauguration), “ “I approve the use of the autopen for the execution of all of the following pardons.”

Zients, observers have pointed out, had previously served as the White House’s multi-millionaire Covid co-ordination tsar who stood to profit off investments made during Fauci’s management of the pandemic.

Despite this, Biden told the paper that “I made every decision,” which is reassuring because as everyone knows politicians whether past or present never shade the truth in order to burnish their legacy.

The only reason the device was used was because “we’re talking about a whole lot of people.”

Yet even as the former president, who was generous enough to give the New York Times a full ten minutes over the phone, claimed to be across all the details, the Times account suggested otherwise.

A bit later in their report, the Times admits that Biden’s staff said the then-president did not really make clemency decisions, and that the staffers who executed the signings were not present when he supposedly authorised them.

In many cases, pardons or clemencies were granted as part of broad categories.

The only pardon Joe Biden signed with his own hand is that of his son Hunter Biden. Picture: AFP

Contra the former president’s claims to the Times, the paper reported, “Mr. Biden did not individually approve each name for the categorical pardons that applied to large numbers of people, he and aides confirmed.”

“Rather, after extensive discussion of different possible criteria, he signed off on the standards he wanted to be used to determine which convicts would qualify for a reduction in sentence.”

The only pardon Biden signed with is own hand, according to the Times, was the full pardon he gave to his son Hunter – something he promised not to do on multiple occasions before the 2024 election.

The New York Times story also included what poker players call a “tell” – a subtle signal indicating the sort of hand they’re actually holding.

“Age-related cognitive decline is a spectrum,” the paper wrote, noting that at one end some older people might “become more prone to blanking on names” while others might “develop profound dementia.”

For his part, Trump is not backing down on the story.

“I guarantee Biden knew nothing about the pardons signed by the autopen,” he told reporters at the White House Monday.

“The autopen is maybe one of the biggest scandas that we’ve had in 50, 100 years.”

That may be so, but it is hard to see how apart from further tarnishing Biden’s reputation and raising more questions about who really was in charge for the four years of his presidency anything will change.

Originally published as James Morrow opinion: How Joe Biden’s autograph became a hot-button issue