An explosive New York Times interview with former President Joe Biden revealed that he signed off on pardon guidelines for the mass pardons of drug and other offenders, and delegated signoff authority to his chief of staff, who then directed the autopen. These revelations will surely blow the ongoing autopen scandal wide open. And yet, NBC News was the only legacy network nightly newscast to report on the revelations.
Watch, as NBC’s Garrett Haake squeezed the autopen disclosures into his White House roundup:
Behold the only legacy network newscast mention of the exploding Biden autopen scandal: 29 seconds on NBC Nightly News. pic.twitter.com/su2JpGj2gV
— Jorge Bonilla (@BonillaJL) July 15, 2025
GARRETT HAAKE: Tonight, President Trump also responding to former President Biden who, in a new interview with The New York Times called Trump and other Republicans “liars" for saying his aides had used an autopen without his authorization for thousands of pardons and clemencies issued in his administration's final weeks. Biden telling the times, quote, “I made every decision”, while acknowledging his staff used an autopen to apply his signature because he said “we're talking about a whole lot of people”. Trump, who has also made use of an autopen, responding.
DONALD TRUMP: I guarantee he knew nothing about what he was signing. I guarantee it.
The 29-second brief, reactively set to Trump-hostile framing, didn’t even come close to addressing the substance of the revelations, or the process for some of these pardons. Per the Times:
Mr. Biden did not individually approve each name for the categorical pardons that applied to large numbers of people, he and aides confirmed. Rather, after extensive discussion of different possible criteria, he signed off on the standards he wanted to be used to determine which convicts would qualify for a reduction in sentence.
Even after Mr. Biden made that decision, one former aide said, the Bureau of Prisons kept providing additional information about specific inmates, resulting in small changes to the list. Rather than ask Mr. Biden to keep signing revised versions, his staff waited and then ran the final version through the autopen, which they saw as a routine procedure, the aide said.
These revelations alone warranted more than 29 seconds on NBC, and crickets on ABC, CBS, Univision and Telemundo. There will certainly be subpoenas and further congressional hearings on the autopen pardons, and time will tell whether the networks chime in at that point.
What is clear: a cabal of unelected White House officials freely usurped and exercised presidential power. In the case of pardons, that power is absolute. Time will tell whether these staffers will face accountability, or whether the legacy media will get off their backsides and cover it.
Click “expand” to view the full transcript of the aforementioned report as aired on NBC Nightly News on Monday, July 14th, 2025:
TOM LLAMAS: Now to the new move by President Trump announcing the U.S. will send military aid to Ukraine, paid for by NATO allies. And issuing a warning to Vladimir Putin if he does not make a peace deal. Garrett Haake is at The White House.
GARRETT HAAKE: Tonight, as Russian troops push across the battlefields of eastern Ukraine, President Trump unveiling a new plan to force Vladimir Putin to the negotiating table: rearm Ukraine with American military aid, including Patriot air defense system, that will be distributed and paid for by NATO allies.
DONALD TRUMP: This is billions of dollars worth of military equipment that's going to be purchased from the United States, going to NATO, et cetera. (VIDEO SWIPE) They're paying for everything. We're not paying anymore.
HAAKE: President Trump also setting a 50-day deadline for Putin to end the war or face imposition of what he called secondary tariffs meant to choke off Russia's economy through steep penalties on its trading partners.
DONALD TRUMP: We're going to do secondary tariffs if we don't have a deal in 50 days, it’s very simple. And they will be at 100%.
HAAKE: The president making plain his frustration with Putin's flattery and failures to follow through on talks of peace.
TRUMP: I go home, I tell the First Lady, “I spoke to Vladimir today, we had a wonderful conversation. She said, oh, really? Another city was just hit.” So it's like, look, he's -- I don't want to say he's an assassin, but he's a tough guy.
HAAKE: Ukraine's president Zelenskyy reacting saying, “I am grateful to President Trump for his readiness to help protect our people's lives.”
Tonight, President Trump also responding to former President Biden who, in a new interview with The New York Times called Trump and other Republicans “liars" for saying his aides had used an autopen without his authorization for thousands of pardons and clemencies issued in his administration's final weeks. Biden telling the times, quote, “I made every decision”, while acknowledging his staff used an autopen to apply his signature because he said “we're talking about a whole lot of people”. Trump, who has also made use of an autopen, responding.
TRUMP: I guarantee he knew nothing about what he was signing. I guarantee it.
HAAKE: And tonight, in a victory for President Trump, the Supreme Court ruled he can fire nearly 1400 employees in the Department of Education, after a lower court blocked the mass layoffs. The president wants to eliminate the department, which only Congress can do. Tom.
LLAMAS: All right. Garrett, thank you.
