The drip of revelations about Joe Biden’s final year in office has turned into a flood — and the newest leak strikes at the very heart of presidential authority. A memo obtained by Just the News shows that Biden was not personally reviewing or signing many of his administration’s clemency actions. Instead, his Vice President, Kamala Harris, was reportedly greenlighting pardons on his behalf, with staff and an autopen machine handling the rest.
The memo’s blunt phrasing leaves little doubt: “The Vice President’s approval was sufficient to obtain his approval.” Translation: Harris was effectively calling the shots.
That’s not how the Constitution works. The power to grant pardons is among the most serious responsibilities of the presidency, one rooted in Article II itself. For good reason, it was always expected that the president personally weigh clemency requests.
Yet by 2024, aides openly admitted in internal communications that Biden couldn’t keep up. One staff note conceded it often took “days or weeks” to get paperwork reviewed — if the president reviewed it at all. Increasingly, staff bypassed him, turning instead to Harris to expedite decisions.
The irregularities didn’t stop there. Records suggest Biden may not have even attended four high-level clemency meetings where controversial cases were debated — including preemptive pardons for Hunter Biden, Dr. Anthony Fauci, Liz Cheney, and even federal death row inmates. The National Archives confirmed it had no notes or documentation proving Biden was in the room.
Meanwhile, the autopen churned on. Nearly all of Biden’s major pardons during his final year were authorized not with his hand, but with a mechanical facsimile of his signature. That includes roughly 2,500 drug-related commutations and dozens of politically charged pardons. In total, Biden granted over 4,200 clemencies, shattering historical records.
The Trump campaign has seized on the revelations, alleging that Biden “outsourced” one of the presidency’s most solemn powers. For them, it bolsters a narrative of an Oval Office adrift, where authority was quietly transferred behind closed doors and constitutional processes bent for political convenience.
Even Biden’s own public comments haven’t helped. Earlier this year, he admitted he approved only the “broad contours” of certain clemencies and wasn’t always aware of the specific names involved.
Taken together, the picture is stark: a president either unwilling or unable to execute his constitutional duties, a vice president quietly filling the vacuum, and a process hidden from the public eye until now.
