President Donald Trump has ordered an unprecedented investigation into former President Joe Biden‘s administration amid concerns his predecessor and his aides covered up his cognitive decline.
“In recent months, it has become increasingly apparent that former President Biden’s aides abused the power of Presidential signatures through the use of an autopen to conceal Biden’s cognitive decline and assert Article II authority,” Trump wrote in a presidential memorandum signed on Wednesday. “This conspiracy marks one of the most dangerous and concerning scandals in American history.”
The president added: “Given clear indications that President Biden lacked the capacity to exercise his Presidential authority, if his advisors secretly used the mechanical signature pen to conceal this incapacity, while taking radical executive actions all in his name, that would constitute an unconstitutional wielding of the power of the Presidency, a circumstance that would have implications for the legality and validity of numerous executive actions undertaken in Biden’s name.”
The investigation, to be led by White House Counsel David Warrington in coordination with Attorney General Pam Bondi, is to uncover whether “certain individuals conspired to deceive the public about Biden’s mental state and unconstitutionally exercise the authorities and responsibilities of the President,” according to the memorandum.
The memorandum details Trump’s desire to investigate whether Biden’s aides conspired to make false statements about the president’s capabilities and to dismiss recorded videos of his cognitive inability as fake.
“The Counsel to the President shall also investigate, in consultation with the Attorney General and the head of any other relevant agency, the circumstances surrounding Biden’s supposed execution of numerous executive actions during his final years in office,” the memorandum states. “This investigation shall address: (i) the policy documents for which the autopen was used, including clemency grants, Executive Orders, Presidential memoranda, or other Presidential policy decisions; and (ii) who directed that the President’s signature be affixed.”
The memorandum coincides with a separate Justice Department investigation by Ed Martin into whether Biden “was competent and whether others were taking advantage of him through use of AutoPen or other means” that Martin announced earlier this week.
Both House and Senate Republicans have launched their own investigations into Biden’s autopen use and whether he was in charge during his presidency, including House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-KY), who is asking former Biden aides and his White House physician, Dr. Kevin O’Connor, to sit for transcribed interviews before his panel.
Biden’s cognitive decline is under renewed scrutiny after the publication last month of Original Sin, a book by Jake Tapper and Alex Thompson, which reports on how Biden aides protected and shielded the former president.
