Missouri AG wants DOJ to probe whether staff exploited Biden's cognitive decline in final days

Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey wants the Department of Justice to investigate whether staffers of Preisdent Biden took advantage of his cognitive decline to issue “radical” policies at the end of his term without his full understanding.

Mr. Bailey, a Republican, announced Wednesday that he has asked DOJ Inspector General Michael Horowitz to conduct a “full investigation” into the ex-president’s mental capacity during his final days in office, when he broke records for presidential acts of clemency.

“I am demanding the DOJ investigate whether President Biden’s cognitive decline allowed unelected staff to push through radical policy without his knowing approval,” Mr. Bailey posted on X. “If true, these executive orders, pardons, and all other actions are unconstitutional and legally void.”

He cited Mr. Biden’s decisions after the November election to commute the federal death sentences of 37 out of 40 prisoners to life in prison, grant his son Hunter Biden a retroactive blanket pardon after insisting he would not do so and make the “legally frivolous” claim that the Equal Rights Amendment is part of the U.S. Constitution.

Mr. Biden granted 4,245 acts of clemency during his four-year term, exceeding the previous record of 3,796 held by former President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who served in office for 12 years.

Nearly all, or 96%, of Mr. Biden’s acts of clemency were granted after Oct. 1, according to the Pew Research Center.

“On Jan. 17 alone, he granted 2,490 commutations, more in a single day than any prior chief executive had granted over their entire presidency,” said the center in its Feb. 7 analysis.

— Attorney General Andrew Bailey (@AGAndrewBailey) March 5, 2025

In his Tuesday letter to Mr. Horowitz, Mr. Bailey said the 11th-hour orders “strongly suggest exploitation by staffers and officials who wanted to promulgate far-left policies without any accountability or democratic legitimacy.”

“Staffers and the Vice President cannot constitutionally evade accountability by laundering far-left orders through a man who does not know what he is signing,” Mr. Bailey said. “If in fact this has been occurring, then all those orders are void.”

He noted that the former president commuted the sentences of several inmates whose crimes were committed in Missouri, and that the Supreme Court has ruled that states may try suspects previously prosecuted on federal criminal charges.

“States like Missouri need to know whether to pursue that path or similar paths,” Mr. Bailey said in his letter.

Mr. Biden was reportedly forced out of the 2024 presidential race by leading Democrats after his rickety June 27 debate performance spurred alarm over his mental capacity. His replacement, Vice President Kamala Harris, went on to lose the Nov. 5 election to President Trump.

Mr. Biden, who turned 82 on Nov. 20, said in a post-election interview that he believes he could have defeated Mr. Trump, but wasn’t sure whether he was up to completing another four-year term.

“So far, so good,” he said in the Jan. 8 interview with USA Today. “But who knows what I’m going to be when I’m 86 years old?”