Trump Voids 92% Biden Signatures
Auto Pen scandal exposes administrative state overreach. Bureaucrats sign laws without review, eroding our freedoms.
Never a dull moment in the news coming out of the White House. Today, we learned that President Donald Trump suddenly declared that 92% of former President Joe Biden’s signatures will be voided due to the prior administration’s use of the Auto Pen.
Trump claims that Biden’s Executive Orders are null and void as the Auto Pen was not used with his direct authorization, but became a “rubber stamp” used by unelected staffers of the Biden administration, and Joe Biden did not know what was being signed.
As an American, I usually cringe at the chaos of politics, but this situation rips the mask off something we’ve been warning about for decades: The Administrative State is running on autopilot, and not in a good way.
For those unfamiliar, the Auto Pen at the White House is exactly what it sounds like. It’s a robot arm that holds a pen and traces a signature. Presidents have used them for decades, usually for routine letters or thank-you notes. It has also been used when a president is abroad, and the president directs a key piece of legislation to be signed.
But now Trump is claiming the Biden administration used the Auto Pen for binding laws and federal pardons without the President actually reviewing the documents.
Sounds like a technology that is ripe for abuse. Can you imagine if the general populace used Auto Pen technology for legal documents? Someone may sign a loan on my home or buy a car on credit without my knowledge. What am I going to say to the bank, “I didn’t sign that?” Of course not. Yet, in the highest office in the land, we accept a system where the “decider” is not even in the room.
If 92% of Biden’s orders were signed by an autopen, it validates the notion that bureaucrats (the people running the machine) are running the show, motivated by their own power and job security, not the “public good.” We live in a Constitutional Republic and cannot have unelected bureaucrats “signing” important legislation or pardons for convicted felons.
Key thinkers like Murray Rothbard warned us about the “Managerial State.” We aren’t being led by elected officials; we are being managed by a faceless human resources department with a robotic arm.
While it is true that Obama and Bush also used autopens (though perhaps not to this scale). And when it comes to Biden’s pardons via Auto Pen, it appears it is irrevocable. After all, we cannot have a system where your freedom depends on whether the President used a Pilot G2 or a robot. If the President is “too busy” or inaccessible to sign the laws that restrict our freedom, then perhaps the government is simply doing too much, and we need to reduce the scope and power the federal government holds over us. If you don’t have time to sign the order, you shouldn’t have the authority to issue it.
Executive order counts for the last 8 U.S. presidents. Data from the American Presidency Project and the Federal Register.
Over the last many decades, the White House has sidelined Congress when taking actions of force against U.S. citizens via Executive Orders. How do we know the president is actually signing all the EOs, instead of staffers?