Trump says Biden's pardons of Jan. 6 committee members are invalid because he used autopen

Dave Goldiner, New York Daily News on Mar 17, 2025

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President Donald Trump Monday claimed that pardons dished out by former President Joe Biden to members of the congressional committee that investigated Jan. 6 are invalid because they were signed using an autopen.

Trump warned members of the panel that they could face a criminal probe because he claimed Biden used an autopen, which is defined as “a device that mechanically reproduces a person’s signature,” instead of physically signing the pardon documents.

“The ‘pardons’ … are hereby declared VOID, VACANT, AND OF NO FURTHER FORCE OR EFFECT, because of the fact that they were done by Autopen,” Trump wrote on his social media site. “In other words, Joe Biden did not sign them but, more importantly, he did not know anything about them.”

Trump added without any evidence that the committee members themselves, including co-chairs Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Mississippi, and ex-Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyoming, engineered the pardons that Biden signed.

“The fact is, they were probably responsible for the documents that were signed on their behalf without the knowledge or consent of (Biden),” Trump added.

Trump says the committee members are guilty of “major crimes,” but hasn’t spelled out any laws he believes they violated.

The panel’s members included Cheney, Thompson and ex-Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Illinois, along with Sen. Adam Schiff, D-California, who was then a House member.

“I am not afraid of Trump’s latest midnight rant that has no basis in reality,” Thompson said in a statement.

Trump did not provide any legal opinions backing his stance. A 2005 opinion issued by the Office of Legal Counsel of the Department of Justice, commissioned by President George W. Bush, declared that the practice of signing official documents with an autopen is legally binding.

“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,” the opinion declared.

Biden ordered the preemptive pardons in January in one of his final acts before leaving office on Jan. 20.

He said he took the action to protect public figures who had investigated and criticized Trump would not face retaliatory action under his second term, a prospect that Trump has reinforced by insisting he will seek “retribution” against enemies.

Bidan also handed out preemptive pardons to other Trump nemeses like Dr. Anthony Fauci and Mark Milley, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Trump didn’t mention those pardons, so it’s not clear if he considers them to be valid or not.

Regardless of Trump’s claim, courts have generally refused to put any limits on the presidential pardon power. Most legal experts believe that would make it practically impossible for Trump to overturn the pardons of the Jan. 6 committee members.

Any possible criminal probe would also face a major uphill struggle because members of Congress are protected from prosecution for their official actions by the Constitution’s Speech and Debate Clause.