Donald Trump has revealed that Joe Biden’s White House portrait is going to feature the Democrat’s infamous autopen which is currently subject to an investigation.
The president was showing off his plans for some of the new features in and around the White House on Friday when he presented a Daily Caller reporter with a sketch of his predecessor’s official portrait.
‘We put up a picture of the autopen,’ Trump said of the picture, which he says will go up in the next two weeks.
It wasn’t specified whether the photo would be Biden with the autopen or just the autopen itself.
Trump showed reporter Reagan Reese what the portrait ‘will look like in the Rose Garden’ on what Trump is calling the ‘Presidential Wall of Fame.’
‘I think the black and white – same picture, but black and white. Yeah, and I’m not using that one with the smile,’ Trump said, as he, Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt and Communications Director Steven Cheung showed Reese various portrait options.
‘I’m using – show the other one that we’re using because I like it. This is going to be very controversial,’ he added, presumably referring to the portrait containing the autopen.
Reese told the president in response: ‘It’s going to be funny.’
He then appeared to give some hint toward the White House investigation into the scandal, which Trump has previously called ‘disgraceful.’
Donald Trump has revealed that Joe Biden’s White House portrait is going to feature the Democrat’s infamous autopen which is currently subject to an investigation
The president was showing off his plans for some of the new features in an around the White House when he presented a reporter with a sketch of his predecessor’s official portrait
‘It’s true though, now they’re finding the autopen, which should not have been used,’ he said.
Early in his term, Trump ordered Attorney General Pam Bondi and White House Counsel David Warrington to investigate Biden’s use of the autopen. Congressional Republicans have begun their own probe.
In a scathing memorandum, Trump stated: ‘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.
‘This conspiracy marks one of the most dangerous and concerning scandals in American history. The American public was purposefully shielded from discovering who wielded the executive power, all while Biden’s signature was deployed across thousands of documents to effect radical policy shifts.’
Trump’s directive calls for a forensic review of every document signed during Biden’s presidency.
It includes everything from pardons, executive orders, judicial appointments and proclamations to determine which bore Biden’s authentic signature and which were replicated by autopen.
The autopen, though little-known to the public, has long been used by US presidents to manage the deluge of documents requiring a signature.
The device can accurately replicate a signature, saving presidents precious time.
Donald Trump has called for a forensic review of every document signed during Biden’s presidency
Congressional Republicans have begun their own probe
The Justice Department, under Democratic and Republican administrations, has recognized the use of an autopen by presidents to sign legislation and issue pardons for decades – and even Trump himself acknowledges using it.
‘Autopens to me are used when thousands of letters come in from young people all over the country and you want to get them back,’ Trump has said previously.
‘Biden’s cognitive issues and apparent mental decline during his presidency were even ‘worse’ in private, and those closest to him ‘tried to hide it’ from the public.
‘To do so, Biden’s advisors during his years in office severely restricted his news conferences and media appearances, and they scripted his conversations with lawmakers, government officials, and donors, all to cover up his inability to discharge his duties.’
Past presidents, including George W. Bush and Barack Obama, have employed the autopen in limited circumstances, such as signing routine letters or lower-level appointments.
However, critics argue that Biden’s reliance on the device was unprecedented.
An exhaustive review by the Oversight Project found that nearly every document from Biden’s presidency from 2021 to 2025 bore identical autopen signatures, except for the document announcing his withdrawal from the 2024 presidential race.
Biden’s reliance on the autopen came as his public appearances diminished, with aides scripting his engagements, heavily curating his interactions with lawmakers, and significantly limiting press conferences.
‘We put up a picture of the autopen,’ Trump said of the picture of Biden, which he says will go up in the next two weeks. ‘It’s going to be very controversial’
Behind the scenes, insiders claimed Biden’s inner circle – including family members – wielded disproportionate influence, raising fresh questions about who was truly making presidential decisions.
Trump has regularly pointed to the issue since the first reports of Biden’s use of the device, claiming his predecessor was incompetent and many of his actions were invalid.
The move came after Biden spoke to the New York Times and said he ‘decided’ on the commutations that bore his signature.
‘I made every decision,’ he told the paper, which also reviewed internal email traffic among senior aides who met with the president about commutations, then sent around emails to keep a record of what happened.
Biden knocked down the sentences of about 4,000 federal convicts, while issuing ‘preemptive’ pardons of Trump targets including former chairman of the joint chiefs Gen. Mark Milley and members of the House January 6th committee.
‘Everybody knows how vindictive he is, so we knew that they’d do what they’re doing now,’ Biden said. ‘I consciously made all those decisions.’
Trump, however, has claimed repeatedly that Trump was experiencing mental decline and had ‘no idea’ what he was doing.
‘The autopen I think is maybe one of the biggest scandals that we’ve had in 50 to 100 years. This is a tremendous scandal,’ Trump told reporters in the Oval Office in June.
White House counsel David Warrington (left) and Attorney General Pam Bondi (right) will lead the probe to investigate Biden’s use of the autopen
‘I guarantee you he knew nothing about what he was signing. I guarantee it.’
Some of the pardons, including those in the final hours of Biden’s term, followed extensive public reporting about whether he would do it.
Biden told the Times he used the device because there were too many commutations for him to have done individually.
‘We’re talking about a whole lot of people,’ he said.
Instead, he signed off on the criteria and standards he wanted to be used to determine which criminals received reduced sentences.
This placed offenders into categories, some of which were issued sweeping pardons.
Trump, meanwhile, has made it a practice to regularly hold press events when slapping his John Hancock onto executive orders.
The one glaring exception was Biden’s controversial hand-signed pardon of his son Hunter, shielding him from prosecution for any federal crimes committed between January 1, 2014, and December 1, 2024.
For months, Biden had assured the American public he would not interfere in his son’s legal woes but in December 2024, after Hunter pleaded guilty to felony gun charges and faced additional federal tax violations, Biden suddenly reversed course
Trump, while acknowledging he occasionally used the autopen himself, argues Biden’s alleged overuse could nullify significant executive actions.
‘Essentially, whoever used the autopen was the president,’ Trump said during a press conference. ‘That’s wrong. It’s illegal. It’s so bad and it’s so disrespectful to our country.’
House Oversight Chairman James Comer has launched parallel inquiries, demanding testimony from Biden’s former top aides including Mike Donilon, Anita Dunn, Ron Klain, Bruce Reed, and Steve Ricchetti, alleging they participated in a ‘cover-up’ of Biden’s cognitive decline.
Comer cited explosive allegations from CNN’s Jake Tapper and Axios’ Alex Thompson’s book ‘Original Sin,’ which claimed ‘five people were running the country, and Joe Biden was at best a senior member of the board.’
The committee has also issued subpoenas for Biden’s physician Kevin O’Connor and several White House aides who reportedly helped shield Biden’s true condition from public view.
Republicans argue that if Biden’s aides, not Biden himself, made key decisions, it could throw into question the validity of major executive actions including the pardons of his siblings, other family members, and members of the House committee investigating the January 6 Capitol riot.
