"It has long been known Joe Biden was suffering from progressive dementia that obviously and grossly affected his cognitive and physical abilities. Speculation as to who was actually running the country has been rampant. This speculation was heightened when it was revealed Biden didn’t personally review commutations and pardons: ". . .
. . . "The issue becomes more acute when an autopen is used to sign documents with legal effect such as treaties, laws, executive orders and the like. The Constitution is essentially mute on the issue. Autopens did not exist in the late 1700s. However, the DOJ issued a July 2005 opinion which essentially established:
The President need not personally perform the physical act of affixing his signature to a bill he approves and decides to sign in order for the bill to become law. Rather, the President may sign a bill within the meaning of Article I, Section 7 by directing a subordinate to affix the President’s signature to such a bill, for example by autopen.
"Note the opinion refers to bills, but what of pardons, commutations and similar documents? George Washington Law Professor Jonathan Turley addressed the issue of Joe Biden’s blanket pardons:
So, at least for this senior Justice Department official, it was not just Biden who may have had little idea of what pardons were being issued under his name. The confusion was shared by implementing attorneys. That is a serious problem in the use of this presidential power by unseen, unnamed staff members. [skip]
What is particularly disconcerting is how accountability for any abuse is made more difficult by the large number of staff contributing to these lists and lack of clearly defined decision makers. With Biden abdicating his own responsibility, staffers were allowed to effectively add names to a signed blank page, exercising a presidential power with the level of circumspection of an inter-office memo.. . . More...
