By Jeff Mason
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Donald Trump directed his White House counsel on Wednesday to investigate whether former President Joe Biden’s aides covered up alleged mental decline and unlawfully used an autopen on Biden’s behalf to sign policy documents.
Biden, who is fighting cancer, said he was responsible for the decisions made during his administration and suggested Trump’s move was designed to distract Americans from a bill in Congress that would extend tax cuts for the wealthy.
Republican Trump has long asserted that Biden, a Democrat who defeated him in the 2020 presidential election, was mentally incompetent and has suggested the use of a mechanical pen to sign memos, executive orders and grants of clemency during Biden’s four-year-term may have been improper, potentially rendering them invalid.
In a statement late on Wednesday, Biden dismissed those suggestions.
“Let me be clear: I made the decisions during my presidency. I made the decisions about the pardons, executive orders, legislation, and proclamations. Any suggestion that I didn’t is ridiculous and false,” he said in a statement.
Biden’s team said the use of an autopen is a well established legal practice following a presidential decision.
The former president, now 82, stepped aside as the Democratic presidential candidate last year after a disastrous debate against Trump underscored concerns about his age and ability to serve as commander-in-chief for four more years. Trump defeated former Vice President Kamala Harris, who became the Democratic presidential nominee, in November.
Biden’s office said last month that the former president had been diagnosed with an aggressive form of prostate cancer. That development and a new book that cites concerns among Democratic insiders about Biden’s mental acuity as he was seeking re-election have brought renewed attention to the former president’s health.
While in office, Biden’s aides denied that his mental acuity had dipped even as they acknowledged he had aged.
Though he wished Biden well after the cancer diagnosis, Trump has continued to criticize his predecessor for a host of challenges facing the country. His move to investigate aspects of Biden’s time in power took those criticisms to a new level.
In a memorandum, Trump ordered his White House counsel, in consultation with the attorney general, to probe whether “certain individuals conspired to deceive the public about Biden’s mental state and unconstitutionally exercise the authorities and responsibilities of the President.”
The investigation would also look into documents that were signed by autopen, those who directed the use of that device, and any efforts to “purposefully shield” the public from information about Biden’s physical and mental health.
“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,” the memo said. “There are serious doubts as to the decision making process and even the degree of Biden’s awareness of … actions being taken in his name.”
A senior official in Trump’s Justice Department told staff on Monday that he has been directed to investigate whether Biden was competent and whether others had taken advantage of him through the use of an autopen when he granted clemency to members of his family and death row inmates at the end of his term.
(Reporting by Jeff Mason; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)
