The Autopen Conundrum

The Autopen Conundrum
By Terry A. Hurlbut
Since President Joe Biden took office, observers of his public appearances have questioned his physical and mental fitness for office. Those questions necessarily extended to the validity of bill signatures, executive orders, and other Presidential actions. At best, people long suspected that First Lady Jill Biden, or Ambassador Susan Rice, simply placed papers before Biden and said, “Sign,” and he signed. Now comes evidence that no one even bothered to have Biden physically present. Instead, nearly every signature was the product of an automatic signing device – an autopen. One batch of documents bears signatures on a date when multiple witnesses placed Biden elsewhere than the White House. This calls into question the last-minute pardons Biden signed – and could call bills into question, too, depending on circumstances.
What is an autopen?
An autopen is a device for reproducing exactly the signature of a user. In fact the word Autopen is the latest in a long line of registered trademarks that lost their trademark status from common use. (For example, see the Aspirin brand of acetylsalicylic acid, which Bristol-Myers marketed under the trade name Bayer in America. See also Xerox, originally the name of the first maker of photostatic office copiers.) Specifically, the Autopen Company, a subsidiary of Damilic, pioneered the signature machines that today go under that generic name.
Autopens have been a staple of celebrity and legislative life for decades. Alan Alda’s title character in The Seduction of Joe Tynan (1979) used one to sign fundraising mail. He made a judgment that a pen-and-ink signature conferred, and commanded, greater respect than did ordinary “franked” mail.
But the autopen presents an obvious fraud hazard. A pen-and-ink signature should connote physical presence and personal attention. Now a celebrity can get away with using an autopen to produce an autograph. An autograph is at best a collectible, not a legal document. But how can one know that a party to a contract or similar document executed it by hand? In the Age of the Autopen, he can’t.
But the user has a problem, too. All Autopen signatures look exactly the same, unless the user redraws his signature periodically. A clever “Autopen forger” will do this often, or “cycle through” several programmed signatures. No observer could then be any the wiser.
Evidence for an autopen from Biden’s documents
Cornell University considered the autopen conundrum more than a year ago. But they took this note:
Even the U.S. Department of Justice determined that a bill is legal if the president’s signature is added via autopen.
They gave no source for that declaration. Considering the publication date, that would be Merrick Garland’s Justice Department, not Pam Bondi’s. Did the Biden administration worry even then about challenges to the authenticity of the President’s official acts? Very possibly. A ResultHunter search revealed this Digital Autopen Playbook by IDManagement.gov. It contains guidelines for when use of an autopen on documents intended for the Federal Register is acceptable – or not.
The problem surfaced last Tuesday (March 4). Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey challenged the validity of nearly forty commutations of death sentences. He wrote a very strong letter to Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz:
🚨BREAKING: I am demanding the DOJ investigated whether President Biden’s cognitive decline allowed unelected staff to push through radical policy without his knowing approval. If true, these executive orders, pardons, and all other actions are unconstitutional and legally void.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GlTg6qCXMAA6I68?format=jpg&name=large
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GlTg6qjXUAAfAr_?format=jpg&name=large
https://x.com/AGAndrewBailey/status/1897388657557885403
Libs of TikTok reproduced that letter. Then the Oversight Project weighed in, on Thursday.
🚨WHOEVER CONTROLLED THE AUTOPEN CONTROLLED THE PRESIDENCY🚨
We gathered every document we could find with Biden's signature over the course of his presidency. All used the same autopen signature except for the the announcement that the former President was dropping out of the race last year. Here is the autopen signature.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GlYIF9EXoAIFJdk?format=png&name=small
Here is the signature from the letter announcing Biden was dropping out of the race.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GlYIRx6WUAAbukG?format=png&name=small
Recall that former President Biden admitted to [Rep. Mike Johnson (R-La.), Speaker of the House] that he did not remember signing an executive order pausing LNG exports. So, who signed it?
For investigators to determine whether then-President Biden actually ordered the signature of relevant legal documents, or if he even had the mental capacity to, they must first determine who controlled the autopen and what checks there were in place. Given President Biden's decision to revoke Executive Privilege for individuals advising Trump during his first Presidency, this is a knowable fact that can be determined with the correct legal process.
https://x.com/OversightPR/status/1897726502156091716
https://x.com/OversightPR/status/1897726505297305718
https://x.com/OversightPR/status/1897726507319280043
Fox News’ Emma Colton replicated Oversight Project’s experiment:
Fox News Digital, at random, examined more than 20 Biden-era executive orders documented on the Federal Register’s office between 2021 and 2024 and found each had the same signature. 
But then Colton made a strange declaration:
Fox News Digital also examined the signatures on President Donald Trump’s executive orders, which are often signed in public or in front of the media, during his first administration and second administration and found the signatures were also the same.
Often does not mean always. Fox made no apparent distinction between executive orders Trump signed in public or private. In any case, since taking office for the second time, Trump has assiduously signed executive orders in front of reporters. President Joe Biden almost never had any such witnesses.
Can a President literally be in two places at once?
Yesterday the Oversight Project found another problem. Biden “signed” pardons for six felony convicts on December 30, 2022, according to The Gateway Pundit. But Biden was vacationing in the U.S. Virgin Islands on that day.
🚨Biden Autopen Pardons on VACATION?🚨
Who is behind this autopen on 12/30/2022 that pardoned six criminals (with the exact same autopen signature) while Joe Biden was vacationing and golfing in the U.S. Virgin Islands? Note they all say they are “Signed in the City of Washington.” Our autopen investigation continues...
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GltDaA4WoAAPVfK?format=png&name=900x900
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GltDaAuWUAAzsqq?format=jpg&name=medium
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GltDaAlXYAA_j2s?format=jpg&name=medium
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GltDaDJXwAAq2Qc?format=png&name=medium
https://x.com/OversightPR/status/1899185791269810512
Now Alina Habba, Counselor to the President, has vowed to “challenge the validity” of the last-minute pre-emptive pardons Biden granted to January 6 Committee members and witnesses.
Listen, by the way, I wonder if those were auto-signed as well, because I would challenge the validity of it. You never know. Listen, the guy didn't even know what he was doing, but I'll tell you the pardons. He knew what he was doing. I said it months before, he's going to pardon himself. And yes. I almost said to the president, listen, in the joint session speech, want to ask everybody that got a pardon to just stand up, just stand up and tell us why you got a pardon.
https://rumble.com/embed/v6o8fdq/?pub=4teej
Biden didn’t pardon himself. But he pardoned six people under questionable circumstances.
Analysis
The world has now seen evidence that President Joe Biden had the means to transfer his authority to someone else. That means is the autopen. The Oversight Project also has conclusively shown that six pardons went out under his signature while he was elsewhere than he said he was. That alone shows that he did transfer his authority to another person or persons unknown, without proper authority.
Presidents routinely transfer their authority to their Vice-Presidents when they must submit to surgery or some such. Amendment XXV Section 3 gives the procedure:
Whenever the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that he is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, and until he transmits to them a written declaration to the contrary, such powers and duties shall be discharged by the Vice President as Acting President.
Biden didn’t even do that! Instead he let someone use an autopen to “sign” six pardons in his name while he was not even in the United States proper. When else did someone use an autopen while he wasn’t even in the room?
Bills normally become law when a President signs them. Most of the time, bills can become law without actual Presidential signatures, if Presidents do not veto them within ten days. That doesn’t apply toward the end of a session. If Congress adjourns within the ten days, and the President hasn’t signed a bill, that bill dies. How many bills might be invalid on that ground?
By all means, let’s examine Trump’s signatures on executive orders in his two terms, to provide a control. But the concealment of Biden’s cognitive decline was already a scandal. If he wasn’t even doing his job – then who was?
Link to:
The article:
https://cnav.news/2025/03/11/news/autopen-conundrum/

Autopen Company landing page:
https://damilic.com/autopen-products/office-signature-machines

Cornell on autopens:
https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2024/02/autopen-shows-perils-automation-communications

Digital Autopen Playbook:
https://www.idmanagement.gov/playbooks/autopen/

Missouri AG challenges nearly forty death-sentence commutations:
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2025/03/missouri-attorney-general-bailey-demands-doj-investigate-if/
https://x.com/AGAndrewBailey/status/1897388657557885403

Oversight Project posts:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GlYIF9EXoAIFJdk?format=png&name=small
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GlTg6qjXUAAfAr_?format=jpg&name=large
https://x.com/OversightPR/status/1897726502156091716
https://x.com/OversightPR/status/1897726505297305718
https://x.com/OversightPR/status/1897726507319280043

Fox News replicates the experiment:
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/biden-autopen-signature-official-docs-raising-concerns-over-who-controlled-wh-report

The 2022 pardons:
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2025/03/who-is-behind-this-autopen-six-criminals-were/
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GltDaA4WoAAPVfK?format=png&name=900x900
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GltDaAuWUAAzsqq?format=jpg&name=medium
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GltDaAlXYAA_j2s?format=jpg&name=medium
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GltDaDJXwAAq2Qc?format=png&name=medium
https://x.com/OversightPR/status/1899185791269810512

Challenge the validity:
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2025/03/watch-white-house-counselor-alina-habba-says-she/
https://rumble.com/v6qgc3a-alina-habba-says-i-would-challenge-the-validity-of-bidens-autopen-pardons.html?mref=4teej&mc=88ce6

Declarations of Truth:
https://x.com/DecTruth

Declarations of Truth Locals Community:
https://declarationsoftruth.locals.com/

Conservative News and Views:
https://cnav.news/

Clixnet Media
https://clixnet.com/