President Trump’s aides are implementing stricter controls on the use of the autopen after a Heritage Foundation analysis revealed that a top aide to Joe Biden may have overstepped their “authority” by frequently using the mechanical device to sign official documents, according to two former White House sources.
One former Biden White House official told The Post they suspected a senior aide had independently decided what to auto-sign without direct approval from the president. The Post is withholding the staffer’s name due to a lack of concrete evidence and denials from other colleagues. The aide would often claim to know what “the boss” wanted, but others within the administration had “no idea” whether that was true, the source said.
“I feared no one as much as I feared that [staffer]. To me, [the staffer] basically was the president,” the person said. “No one ever questioned [the staffer]. Period.”
The source added that suspicions about the aide’s overreach were widespread, but no one openly challenged them. “Everyone” believed the staffer was making decisions without direct approval from Biden, they said, but no one was willing to say it outright.
A second Biden White House source also suspected the staffer of issuing directives without it being clear if Biden had personally approved them.
In response, the Trump administration has introduced more stringent rules. An internal memo drafted Thursday by Trump staff secretary William Scharf, who has spent the past two months personally presenting documents to Trump for his signature, outlines new restrictions on autopen use.
“We have gone significantly further than [the] need for express approval, both in this Administration and in the First Trump Administration,” Scharf wrote.
A separate memo dated Jan. 28, also reviewed by The Post, grants Scharf and White House chief of staff Susie Wiles authority to use the autopen “for all matters.” Scharf’s deputy and the president’s executive clerk may also approve its use, but only at Scharf’s direction.
