by Sharon Rondeau
(Jun. 1, 2025) — House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Chairman James Comer (R-KY1) told Maria Bartiromo of “Sunday Morning Futures” today that four individuals the committee wishes to interview about the use of an autopen during the Biden term “have hired attorneys. We’re communicating with their attorneys, and I hope that at the beginning of next week, we’ll announce dates when they’ll be coming in for transcribed interviews.”
Comer appeared with author, columnist and Government Accountability Institute (GAI) president Peter Schweizer.
“We want them to walk us through the exact process of how major items of huge legal consequences like pardons and executive orders ended up being placed in the autopen and having Joe Biden’s signature forged on there,” Comer added.
On March 17 and again on May 20, President Trump alleged Biden did not sign an unidentified number of the executive orders, congressional bills and pardons issued during his presidency. Instead, Trump wrote, staffers ran the documents through the autopen machine without Biden’s knowledge, committing “treason at the highest level.”
The committee also wants to speak with Biden’s physician, Dr. Kevin O’Connor, Comer told Bartiromo this morning and Sean Hannity on Thursday evening.
On May 22 Comer gave all five — O’Connor; Biden aides Annie Thomasini, Anthony Bernal and Ashley Williams; and Domestic Policy Council Director Neera Tanden — a May 29 deadline to “confirm” they would appear in front of the committee on June 18, 2025.
Should they fail to respond, Comer had said, subpoenas would be considered.
A confluence of events, including the release of the book “Original Sin” last month by journalists Jake Tapper of CNN and Alex Thompson of Axios claiming aides surrounding Joe Biden orchestrated an elaborate scheme to hide his growing cognitive decline; previous credible media articles; “whistleblower” statements reportedly provided in recent weeks to Trump administration pardon attorney Ed Martin; and the May 18 announcement of Biden’s advanced-stage prostate cancer with no mention of it in his White House medical reports, has led many in Congress to question who was running the country during the Biden years.
In a recent interview with independent journalist Mark Halperin, Martin said he received “unprecedented admissions” from a senior Biden 2020 campaign figure turned “whistleblower.” Martin then named three “gatekeepers” of the White House who he was told managed “access” to Biden.
Those individuals, Martin said, are then-Biden personal attorney Robert Bauer; his wife, Anita Dunn, who served as a senior adviser to Biden; and former White House Chief of Staff Ron Klain.
“(Steve) Ricchetti a little bit and obviously Jill (Biden)” were also part of the group, Martin added.
Bauer and Dunn were key players in the Obama White House.
In January 2023, NBC reported:
For more than three decades, Bob Bauer and Anita Dunn have climbed to the summit of Washington power.
Bauer, the personal lawyer to President Joe Biden who served as White House counsel under President Barack Obama, is the godfather of Democratic election lawyers. Dunn, an adviser to Biden in the White House who was communications director under Obama, is the city’s grande dame of public relations.
Use of an autopen by government executives is “legal,” Martin told Bartiromo in an appearance on the May 21 editor of “Mornings with Maria,” but must be accompanied by mental competence on the part of the person whose signature is replicated.
A Fox News article published the same day reported that according to “Original Sin,” Ricchetti personally called a reporter who had been in touch with the White House press office about reports she heard from “anonymous aides” as to Biden’s infirmity. According to the book’s authors, Ricchetti issued a “tacit threat” to convince her not to publish a story which “worked.”
In March 2017, Trump tweeted that his campaign had been “wiretapped” by the Obama regime to much ridicule and pushback from the mainstream media. However, his claim was ultimately validated by the House Oversight Committee, chaired by then-Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA), and found to have been part of a false narrative to characterize Trump and his 2016 campaign as having “colluded” with the Russian government.
Years later, a final report by Special Counsel John Durham revealed the FBI probe, dubbed “Crossfire Hurricane,” was launched improperly and defied basic FBI guidelines and standards.
“I said [next week]; this is Sunday,” Comer said at the conclusion of the interview. “We’re talking about in a matter of days, hours, we should be able to hopefully announce something about these five individuals coming in.”