US election 2020: Pompeo insists Trump set for a second term

America’s top diplomat Mike Pompeo insists that Donald Trump will remain in power, as Joe Biden takes calls from world leaders.

Chuck Schumer, the top Democrat in the Senate, has told Mike Pompeo to ‘move on’. Picture: AFP

The leaders of US allies on Tuesday telephoned Joe Biden and pledged to work together but, in an extraordinary break from diplomatic protocol, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo insisted Donald Trump would remain in power.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel offered congratulations in calls to the president-elect, who a week earlier edged out Mr Trump in the presidential election.

“I’m letting them know that America is back. We’re going to be back in the game. It’s not America alone,” Mr Biden told reporters in his home state of Delaware on Wednesday AEDT.

The transition team said Mr Biden planned to work with the Europeans on fighting the COVID-19 pandemic as well as climate change — one of many areas on which Mr Trump sharply differed with the allies.

On the call with Mrs Merkel, who has been savaged by Mr Trump over her welcoming of migrants and Germany’s modest defence expenditure, Mr Biden in a statement “praised her leadership” and called for “revitalising the trans-Atlantic relationship”.

Mr Johnson, who had a warm relationship with Mr Trump, spoke for 20 minutes with Mr Biden and wrote later on Twitter that he hoped to work with him on “building back better from the pandemic”, employing the slogan from the Democrat’s campaign.

All fellow leaders of the Group of Seven industrialised democracies have congratulated Mr Biden, as have some of Mr Trump’s closest allies including Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

Mr Trump has refused to concede and vowed legal action despite the networks and AP concluding on Sunday that Mr Biden enjoyed unassailable leads in key states as well as a commanding edge in the popular vote.

Mr Pompeo made clear that Mr Trump’s stance was official government policy as he brushed aside a question on whether he was co-operating with the Biden transition team.

“There will be a smooth transition to a second Trump administration,” Mr Pompeo said in a sometimes testy news conference.

He said “the world should have every confidence” in the functioning of the US government in the run-up and after the January 20 inauguration.

Asked if the US could still be issuing statements urging free elections around the world, Mr Pompeo called the question “ridiculous” and said the US was following standard procedures.

Chuck Schumer, the top Democrat in the Senate, said Mr Pompeo was out of touch with reality. “Secretary Pompeo, Joe Biden has won. He’s won the election. Now move on,” Senator Schumer said. “We have a COVID crisis raging. We don’t have time for these kinds of games.”

Mr Trump’s failure to concede has no legal force in itself but the General Services Administration, the usually low-key agency that manages the Washington bureaucracy, has refused to sign off on the transition, holding up funding and security briefings.

A US commission that investigated the September 11, 2001, attacks had warned that presidential transitions posed security risks, after the shortened period for George W. Bush to prepare following a disputed election.

Mr Pompeo was making his first public comment on the election outcome. A day earlier, Mr Trump fired defence secretary Mark Esper, whom he had long seen as insufficiently loyal.

Mr Pompeo’s stance will be put to the test as he leaves Friday for a seven-nation tour of allies that have congratulated Mr Biden. He will head first to France, then to Turkey, followed by the former Soviet republic of Georgia. He will then head to Israel and three Gulf Arab allies — Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar.

On Wednesday Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan became the latest leader to congratulate Mr Biden despite Mr Biden’s vows to step up pressure on Mr Erdogan, whom he has described as an “autocrat”. Russia, China, Mexico and Brazil are among the only major nations that have not congratulated Mr Biden.

The president-elect, an Irish-American long passionate about peace in Northern Ireland, spoke on Tuesday to Irish Prime Minister Micheal Martin and a day earlier held telephone talks with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who is expected to be his close ally.

AFP