What type of pen does Donald Trump use? Here's how he signs executive orders.
It has been approximately 48 hours since President Donald Trump assumed office and he's been on signing spree, rolling out executive orders ranging from temporarily halting a U.S. ban on TikTok to ordering all executive agencies to place DEI employees on leave.
And one thing onlookers have noticed: Trump uses a black Sharpie marker to sign the orders.
Video footage and pictures from the Oval Office show Trump wielding the markers and leaving signatures in thick, black ink. In one photo, he holds up a document which shows the broad scribbles on the signature line.
During the Inaugural Parade inside Capital One Arena in Washington D.C., Trump tossed out Sharpies to the crowd. It is not known if the pens had anything special on them.
Trump and Sharpies
Trump's love for his Sharpies is no secret. The president, during his first term, also used Sharpies to sign official documents and make notes and even had the stationary company design a custom pen, embossed with his signature in gold, for him, according to The New York Times and Business Insider. It is not immediately known if he used the custom pens to sign the orders this week.
In a four-part HBO series done in partnership with Axios in 2018, Trump said he disliked using the pens traditionally used by presidents, NYT and Business Insider reported.
"I was signing documents with a very expensive pen, and it didn't write well," Trump said in the documentary. "It was a horrible pen, and it was extremely expensive. And then I started using just a Sharpie, and I said to myself, 'Well wait a minute, this writes much better and this cost almost nothing.'"
He added he then "called up the folks at Sharpie" and said, "‘Do me a favor, can you make the pen in black? Make it look rich?’”
However, Trump's relationship with the Sharpie didn't begin when he stepped into the White House. It precedes his presidency, according to the New York Times, which reported that Trump regularly used the pens to "sign autographs, write notes and mark up printed news articles."
Paste BN reached out to Sharpie manufacturer Newell Brands for a comment.
What is an executive order?
An executive order is a signed directive by a U.S. president on how they want the federal government to operate.
Using the force of the law, these orders range from federal employee holidays to major policy plans. A president may use an executive order to establish a new commission or an administration-wide policy.
What happens after an executive order is signed?
After a president signs an executive order, the White House sends the document to the Office of the Federal Register, the executive branch's journal that publishes each order.
However, there are a few legal barriers as an executive order may be rescinded or amended by either an act by Congress, a Supreme Court order or even a separate executive order.
Contributing: Anthony Robledo, Cybele Mayes-Osterman, Paste BN
Saman Shafiq is a trending news reporter for Paste BN. Reach her at sshafiq@gannett.com and follow her on X and Instagram @saman_shafiq7.