Justice Department replaces Trump pardon documents after identical signatures appear online, fueling partisan accusations and scrutiny over presidential signature authenticity.
The Justice Department was forced into quiet damage control this week after posting multiple Trump pardons online that bore identical copies of the former president’s signature — a discovery that ignited online speculation, forensic scrutiny, and immediate political fireworks.
The pardons, dated Nov. 7 and granted to high-profile recipients including former MLB star Darryl Strawberry, disgraced Tennessee House speaker Glen Casada, and ex–NYPD sergeant Michael McMahon, were uploaded with signatures that were perfect matches. Two independent handwriting experts confirmed to the Associated Press that the signatures were identical down to the finest details — something impossible for a human hand to reproduce.
Within hours, the Justice Department quietly replaced the documents with new versions bearing unique signatures, blaming the issue on a “technical error” and “staffing issues” caused by what spokesperson Chad Gilmartin described as the “Democrat shutdown.”
The DOJ insisted President Trump personally signed all seven pardons, dismissing the controversy as a non-story. “There is no story here other than the fact President Trump signed seven pardons by hand,” Gilmartin declared, though critics and experts alike questioned the sloppy execution and timing.
The White House echoed that line — and then pivoted to attack President Biden.
“Trump signs every pardon by hand,” spokesperson Abigail Jackson wrote. “The media should be investigating Biden’s countless autopen pardons, not this non-story.”
The irony was not lost on observers. Trump has long mocked Biden for using an autopen for routine executive business, even replacing Biden’s White House portrait with a photo of an autopen in his “Presidential Walk of Fame.” Congressional Republicans have also spent months arguing that Biden’s autopen use is evidence of “diminished faculties,” demanding investigations and even suggesting voiding actions signed by the device.
Yet when identical Trump signatures surfaced, GOP committee members rushed to declare that any electronic signature used by Trump would be “legitimate.”
Democrats pounced.
Rep. Dave Min, a California Democrat on the Oversight Committee, blasted the contradictory standards:
“We need to understand who is actually in charge of the White House, because Trump seems to be slipping.”
Legal experts, however, dismissed the uproar as a political sideshow.
“The validity of a pardon depends solely on presidential intent, not the signature method,” said legal historian Frank Bowman. “The re-signing is simply an effort to avoid comparisons to Biden — and a rather silly one.”
The controversy comes amid Trump’s increasingly aggressive pardon spree — mostly benefiting loyalists, donors, and individuals claiming persecution by what the former president labels a “weaponized” Justice Department. It also arrives as critics notice Trump pardoning individuals he claims not to know — including crypto mogul Changpeng Zhao, a case he later called a “Biden witch hunt.”
As the DOJ scrambles to clean up the signature mess, the political fallout continues to intensify, highlighting deep hypocrisy, partisan warfare, and Trump’s increasingly irregular approach to presidential clemency.
