Biden faces renewed scrutiny as emails reveal DOJ flagged thousands of executive pardons signed by autopen

WASHINGTON, DC: Newly surfaced emails reveal that officials inside former President Joe Biden’s own Justice Department raised concerns about the legality and scope of thousands of pardons and commutations that were finalized using an autopen device rather than the president’s personal signature.

The Oversight Project first exposed the issue earlier this year, noting that thousands of executive actions and acts of clemency were issued this way.

Two autopens were used by Joe Biden’s aides

The revelations, tied to an ongoing investigation into the so-called “autopen scandal,” show that Biden’s aides authorized the use of two separate autopen signatures referred to as Autopen A and Autopen B to approve clemency actions without Biden’s direct review of the final lists.

Emails reviewed by The New York Times reveal that while Biden approved general criteria for pardons, he did not sign off on the final names.

The Oversight Project’s report claims Biden aides used two autopens with slight signature differences to push through pardons without his direct approval. The project report claims to have found a second frequently used autopen signature for Joe Biden’s pardons and commutations.

Staff used the autopen to sign them without Biden's direct approval. Senior aides such as Neera Tanden, Jeff Zients, Stephanie Feldman, Ed Siskel and others were involved in the process and managing the autopen execution. Tanden even testified she was authorized to direct autopen use from October 2021 to May 2023 when she was serving as staff secretary and senior advisor to Biden.

DOJ official warned about violent offenders being pardoned

When Biden granted clemency to 2,500 criminals, he said it was only for people convicted of non-violent offenses.

However, one of the most striking disclosures comes from a January 18 email written by Associate Deputy Attorney General Bradley Weinsheimer, just two days before Biden left office. 

The message, reviewed by The Washington Times, shows Weinsheimer cautioned senior administration lawyers that the autopen pardons risked granting clemency to individuals who had committed serious crimes, including killing police officers and children.

Weinsheimer described the wording in one particular warrant which pardoned hundreds of offenders as “highly problematic,” warning that the language was too vague and risked making the commutations “ineffective.”

He further stressed that such wording could extend pardons “in circumstances, including for crimes of violence, that was not intended.”

The veteran DOJ lawyer warned that a statement directly from Biden was needed to clarify “the meaning of the warrant language.”

“One other important note,” the DOJ official continued, “in communication about the commutations, the White House has described those who received commutations as people convicted of non-violent drug offenses. I think you should stop saying that because it is untrue or at least misleading.”

19 problematic Joe Biden commutations had been flagged 

Weinsheimer said at least 19 “highly problematic” commutations had already been flagged; 16 of them involving “grants of clemency from the President.”

He stressed that “violent offenders” were included, making it “misleading to suggest that they are nonviolent drug offenders.”

“There are likely many more problematic cases in the ones we have not yet been able to review,” he added, noting that DOJ was given the warrants only “minutes before you posted the list online.”

Among the grantees some had a history of violent crime.

Russell McIntosh, who “shot to death a woman who had threatened to expose his drug business to the authorities and her two-year-old child,” and Adrian Peeler, who was serving 35 years for “conspiracy to commit murder involving the killing of an 8-year-old witness and his mother.”

Oversight Project says Biden’s autopen process wouldn’t ‘hold up legal scrutiny’

The Oversight Project obtained emails from DOJ pardon attorney Ed Martin’s office to probe possible abuses of Biden’s autopen on clemency orders.

“The way this was done would not hold up legal scrutiny,” Mike Howell, president of the Oversight Project, told The Post.

“You aren’t allowed to put curse words in an email as a lawyer, but this is pretty much the equivalent of a bunch of curse words” at the Biden White House, he said of Weinsheimer’s letter.

Oversight Project attorney Samuel Dewey added, “You have to approve the category on the face of the warrant so that it’s public. So everybody knows what category you used or it’s just an invalid delegation to your staff. And so there was a lot of controversy from that.”

“Biden gave his staff some category  and quite literally, DOJ can’t even figure out what the category is,” Dewey said. “So how is that a permissible use of the autopen?”

“Even under the broadest view of the autopen, even accepting the defense that Biden could somehow set categories, DOJ can’t even figure this out, so how the heck did Biden know what he was doing? He didn’t.”

These revelations come as multiple probes scrutinize Biden’s reliance on the autopen for critical decisions, including pardons.

The DOJ opened an inquiry in June into whether his aides “abused the power of Presidential signatures.”

At the same time, the Trump administration confirmed that Ed Martin, who leads an anti-weaponization working group at the DOJ, is investigating not only the potential misuse of the autopen but also whether Biden himself was competent and if others may have exploited that through its use.