Donald Trump started the week with an announcement that was strange, even by his standards. In a middle-of-the-night missive published to his social media platform, the president wrote that Joe Biden’s pardons for Jan. 6 committee members were, as the Republican put it, “hereby declared VOID, VACANT, AND OF NO FURTHER FORCE OR EFFECT.”
The assertion — without precedent in American history — was apparently based on Trump’s belief that (a) his predecessor used an “autopen” to sign the pardons; (b) documents signed by autopens don’t count; and (c) Biden suffered from mental deterioration to such a horrific degree that he wasn’t aware of his own policies and preferences.
In keeping with his usual m.o., the incumbent president offered no evidence to substantiate any of his claims. What’s more, my MSNBC colleague Jordan Rubin — who has legal expertise that I lack — explained in a great piece that Trump’s pitch has no real basis in law.
What I was curious about, however, was how and whether the White House would defend Trump’s latest broadside against constitutional law, as the president claimed to have a presidential power that did not, and does not, exist.
A few hours after publishing the online item, Trump told reporters, in reference to his effort to invalidate some of Biden’s pardons, “It’s not my decision — that’ll be up to a court — but I would say that they’re null and void.”
Part of the problem with this was that the first part of the sentence was at odds with the second: Trump’s stated position was that the issue isn’t up to him to nullify pardons, but he’s also decided that, as far as he’s concerned, he’s already nullified some pardons.
As for the claim that this will be “up to a court,” the line suggests that Trump expects some kind of escalation that will prompt a legal dispute.
It was against this backdrop that reporters asked White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt whether administration lawyers had told the president that he had legal authority to undo these pardons. The New York Times reported:
She said the president was merely “begging the question” of whether Mr. Biden was even aware of the pardons that had been signed — although she was soon reminded that Mr. Biden had spoken publicly about them. She went on to speculate that there may have been some pardons he didn’t know about, but ultimately acknowledged that she had no evidence that was the case.
Let’s not dwell on the fact that the White House press secretary misused the “beg the question” phrase and instead note that Leavitt suggested that it was up to journalists to try to find evidence that might bolster Trump’s baseless ideas, which is most certainly not how journalism works. Collins: Biden is on the record talking about preemptive pardons for these people Leavitt: But was he aware of his signature being used?Collins: Is there any evidence that he wasn’t aware? Leavitt: You’re a reporter. You should find out So where does that leave us? It’s difficult to say with certainty. Whether Trump believes in his heart of hearts the Biden-era pardons are legitimate or invalidated is a lingering question — it matters when presidents assert powers they don’t have — but his assumptions have little practical significance: The president harbors all sorts of odd beliefs that ultimately prove irrelevant. What matters more is whether anyone at the White House or within federal law enforcement acts on the Republican’s strange assertion and pursues members of the bipartisan Jan. 6 panel. Watch this space.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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