{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://comer.house.gov/2025/10/oversight-committee-releases-report-on-the-biden-autopen-presidency", "Oversight Committee Releases Report on the Biden Autopen Presidency", "2025-10-29", "2025", "2025-10", "Republican", "House", "KY", "James Comer", "C001108", "comer.house.gov", "comer", "https://comer.house.gov/media", "scraper", "The report exposes Biden\u2019s decline, the White House cover-up, and invalid executive actions signed by autopen; Chairman Comer sends referrals to the DOJ and D.C. Board of Medicine\n\nWASHINGTON\u2014Today, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform released a staff report titled \u201cThe Biden Autopen Presidency: Decline, Delusion, and Deception in the White House.\u201d The report exposes how President Joe Biden\u2019s top advisors, political operatives, and personal physician concealed the President\u2019s mental and physical decline from the American people. The findings reveal that as President Biden\u2019s condition deteriorated, his aides exercised presidential authority and facilitated executive actions without his direct authorization, including misusing the autopen and failing to properly document decision-making processes.\n\nFollowing the findings of its investigation, the Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) sent a letter to the U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi requesting the U.S. Department of Justice conduct a comprehensive review of all executive actions taken during the Biden presidency and scrutinize key Biden aides\u2014Dr. Kevin O\u2019Connor, Annie Tomasini, and Anthony Bernal\u2014who pleaded the Fifth Amendment during the investigation. Chairman Comer also sent a letter to the District of Columbia Board of Medicine seeking its review of actions taken by Dr. O\u2019Connor to determine any potential wrongdoing in his medical care of the former president.\n\n\u201cThe Biden Autopen Presidency will go down as one of the biggest political scandals in U.S. history. As Americans saw President Biden\u2019s decline with their own eyes, Biden\u2019s inner circle sought to deceive the public, cover-up his decline, and took unauthorized executive actions with the autopen that are now invalid,\u201d said Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.). \u201cOur report reveals how key aides colluded to mislead the public and the extraordinary measures they took to sustain the appearance of presidential authority as Biden\u2019s capacity to function independently diminished. Executive actions performed by Biden White House staff and signed by autopen are null and void. We are calling on the U.S. Department of Justice to conduct a thorough review of these executive actions and scrutinize key Biden aides who took the Fifth to hide their participation in the cover-up. The D.C. Board of Medicine must also review the actions taken by President Biden\u2019s physician to hide his true condition. We have provided Americans with transparency about the Biden Autopen Presidency, and now there must be accountability.\u201d\n\nThe report is based on 14 depositions and transcribed interviews with key Biden aides. During the investigation, Oversight Committee Democrats did not consider the question of who was running the country for four years to be worth further inquiry. Democrat Members and staff asked only about 3 hours and 30 minutes\u2019 worth of questions over nearly 47 hours of depositions and transcribed interviews. On average, across the 14 interviews and depositions conducted by the Committee, Democrats spent just 15 minutes questioning each witness.\n\nBelow are key findings and recommendations from the report:\n\nBiden\u2019s Decline and Cover-Up: The Oversight Committee found substantial evidence that President Joe Biden experienced significant mental and physical decline during his presidency, while senior White House officials actively sought to conceal his deterioration from the public. President Biden\u2019s inner circle, including top advisors and his physician, undertook coordinated efforts to mislead the public regarding his cognitive state, using scripted messaging, restricted access, and tightly controlled appearances. White House staff meticulously controlled President Biden\u2019s daily activities, public appearances, and workload to mask his declining capabilities. This included restricting media access, avoiding unscripted events, and even seeking input from Hollywood figures on presentation strategy. Key advisors, including senior strategist Mike Donilon, stood to gain financially and politically from maintaining President Biden\u2019s candidacy and suppressing evidence of his decline.\n\nGaslighting the American Public over Concerns about Biden\u2019s Debate Performance and Cognitive Decline: Even a year later, President Biden\u2019s former senior circle denies not only that his cognitive decline was on full display in his 2024 debate with President Trump, but that the public was ever even concerned about cognitive decline. In their view, public concern about Biden\u2019s debate performance was about his \u201cbad cold\u201d and more general feelings about potential limitations due to his advanced age.\n\nPolitical Interference in Medical Decisions and Failure of Medical Oversight: Testimony from senior officials, including Jeff Zients and Anita Dunn, revealed that political advisors interfered with decisions regarding President Biden\u2019s medical evaluations, explicitly rejecting calls for cognitive testing to protect his reelection prospects. Dr. Kevin O\u2019Connor, the President\u2019s physician, did not perform a cognitive assessment of President Biden and invoked his Fifth Amendment right when questioned by the Committee. Testimony suggests that Dr. O\u2019Connor\u2019s medical judgments were influenced by political advisors and that his financial ties to the Biden family presented conflicts of interest.\n\nReferral of Biden\u2019s Physician to D.C. Board of Medicine: Chairman Comer recommends that the District of Columbia Board of Medicine review the actions taken by Dr. O\u2019Connor while serving as the White House physician to President Biden for any potential wrongdoing in the medical care of the former president\u2014including whether Dr. O\u2019Connor produced false or misleading medical reports to the American people.\n\nExercise of Presidential Authority by Biden Aides, Making Executive Actions Signed by Autopen Invalid: Senior Biden staff exercised presidential authority or facilitated executive actions without direct authorization from President Biden himself, including through misuse of the autopen and failures in documenting decision-making processes. The Oversight Committee found alarming deficiencies in the documentation and custody of the President\u2019s decision binder, including instances where executive actions were executed without written authorization or clear record of the President\u2019s approval. The Committee identified irregularities in the issuance of pardons and commutations during the final days of the Biden presidency, including those involving members of the Biden family, where the autopen was used without confirmed presidential authorization or proper documentation.\n\nReferral to DOJ for Review of Executive Actions and Key Aides Involved in the Cover-Up: Chairman Comer is calling on the Department of Justice conduct a comprehensive review of all executive actions taken during the Biden presidency and is referring key Biden aides\u2014Dr. Kevin O\u2019Connor, Annie Tomasini and Anthony Bernal\u2014for further scrutiny after they took the Fifth Amendment during the investigation.\n\nRead the report and letters here:\n\nStaff Report: \u201cThe Biden Autopen Presidency: Decline, Delusion, and Deception in the White House\u201d\n\nLetter to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, U.S. Department of Justice\n\nLetter to Board Chair Dr. Andrea Anderson, District of Columbia Board of Medicine\n\nBelow are links to the transcripts and videos from the depositions and transcribed interviews conducted during the investigation:", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-06T19:32:54Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://comer.house.gov/2025/10/oversight-committee-releases-report-on-the-biden-autopen-presidency"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 0.9962180629372597, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}