Where can I find an official list or database of 2024 executive orders and their signing method?
Executive summary
The official, centralized public source for U.S. presidential executive orders is the Federal Register’s “Executive Orders” pages, which publish orders by president and year and offer bulk downloads (including CSV/JSON) — for 2024 Biden orders the Federal Register lists 19 items available for download [1] [2]. The White House also posts executive orders under “Presidential Actions / Executive Orders,” while third‑party compilations (American Presidency Project, Ballotpedia, law‑firm trackers) provide parallel lists and commentary but are not the primary legal repository [3] [4] [5].
1. Where the official record lives — the Federal Register
The Office of the Federal Register (FederalRegister.gov) maintains the official public record of executive orders, organized by president and year, and makes orders available individually or as bulk downloads; its executive‑orders pages note that orders signed by a president are published in the Federal Register and can be downloaded in CSV/Excel/JSON formats [1] [2]. The site’s disposition tables and downloads are compiled and maintained by OFR editors, which makes it the authoritative searchable dataset for issuance and publication metadata [1].
2. What you’ll find there — metadata and formats
The Federal Register provides each presidential document with publishing details and indexes orders chronologically; for example, it indicates the count and offers machine‑readable formats so researchers can filter by president and year — the Biden 2024 page is described as containing 19 downloadable executive orders [2] [1]. The OFR also explains there is normally a short delay between signing and appearance on public inspection because documents must be delivered to and processed by the Office of the Federal Register [1].
3. The White House copy — publication and contemporary access
The White House’s “Presidential Actions / Executive Orders” pages post the text of orders and serve as the administration’s public announcement channel; this is the site where orders are displayed when the White House releases them, but the Federal Register is the formal publication vehicle [3]. For context, the White House archive also lists orders across administrations, and in practice journalists and legal teams check both the White House posting and the Federal Register [3].
4. Third‑party compilations and trackers — useful but secondary
Independent aggregators such as the American Presidency Project (UCSB), Ballotpedia, Wikipedia, and private law‑firm trackers (Hogan Lovells, Akin, Littler, Holland & Knight) compile and often annotate executive orders; these sources speed research and add topic categorization and summaries but rely on the primary texts published by the Federal Register or the White House [4] [5] [6] [7]. Use them for cross‑checking and historic lists, but treat the Federal Register as the authoritative dataset for legal citation [1] [4].
5. The signing‑method question — what public sources document
Available sources in the provided set do not supply a machine‑readable field that explicitly records “signing method” (for example, whether a signature was hand‑signed, autopen, or otherwise) for each executive order; the Federal Register and White House sites publish the order texts and metadata but do not appear in these snippets to include a standardized “method of signing” attribute [1] [3]. Reporting and legal discussion about signature methods exists in news coverage (e.g., disputes in 2025 reporting about use of an autopen), but the official publication record focuses on the document, date, and numbering rather than a signed‑by‑what‑device field [8].
6. Disputes and context — why signing method became politically salient
News reporting captured disputes over whether autopen signatures affect validity: for example, coverage of a 2025 claim that many of Biden’s executive actions were signed by an autopen notes legal analysts arguing an autopen does not negate an order’s legitimacy and that presidents can revoke predecessors’ orders irrespective of signature method [8]. That reporting shows signing‑method debates are often political and legal commentary, not settled by a separate, official public registry that labels orders by signing tool [8].
7. Practical next steps for your research
Start at the Federal Register’s Executive Orders pages for 2024 to download the full authoritative set and metadata (CSV/JSON) [1] [2]. Cross‑check each item on the White House “Presidential Actions / Executive Orders” page for White House text and release context [3]. Use Ballotpedia, American Presidency Project, and reputable legal trackers for summaries, timelines, and topic tagging; and consult news analysis for any controversies about signatures or revocations — but note that official sources do not, in the provided material, include a discrete “signing method” field [5] [4] [8].
Limitations: the provided sources show where the orders and counts are published and where controversy over autopen use was reported, but they do not demonstrate an official database column that records signing method for each order — available sources do not mention an official “signing method” field in the Federal Register or White House metadata [1] [3] [8].