@powelski I don't think this alone should be the way we define auto-drafts, can't we use `'auto-draft' === $post->post_status` as per https://github.com/WordPress/WordPress/blob/master/wp-admin/includes/post.php#L473 ?
[Skimming through WP code] (https://github.com/WordPress/WordPress/search?p=1&q=auto-draft&ref=cmdform) i find lots of references to the same check