‘Politics is tough’: Trump meets Biden at the White House
The two men met in the Oval Office with the pair emphasising a peaceful handover of power, a moment that stood in contrast to the discord that followed Joe Biden’s 2020 victory over Donald Trump.
President-elect Donald Trump met with President Biden in the Oval Office with the two leaders shaking hands and emphasising a peaceful handover of power, a moment that stood in contrast to the discord that followed Biden’s 2020 victory over Trump.
“Congratulations and I’m looking forward to having a smooth transition,” Biden said Wednesday. “Welcome – welcome back.”
Trump thanked the president. “Politics is tough and it’s, [in] many cases, not a very nice world but it is a nice world today,” he said, adding the change in power would be “as smooth as it can get.” They didn’t take questions from reporters before continuing the meeting.
It came less than five months after Biden’s poor June debate performance, which forced him to drop his re-election bid, clearing the way for Vice President Kamala Harris, who lost handily to Trump last week.
It also marked Trump’s dramatic return to Washington. He revelled in the attention as he stands poised to take over in January with a Republican Party united behind him and as he builds out an administration of loyalists determined to make quick work of his agenda.
The president-elect’s plane landed at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland at 9.24am, marking Trump’s first time there since he left office on Jan. 20, 2021, skipping Biden’s inauguration, the first president to do that since 1869.
Trump was joined by Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who has taken an unusually big role in planning for the new administration and will oversee, along with biotech company founder Vivek Ramaswamy, the newly formed Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE. The group’s mandate is to streamline government bureaucracy.
Trump then met with House Republicans, getting a standing ovation. “They used to call Bill Clinton the comeback kid,” House Speaker Mike Johnson (R., Ga.) said, calling Trump “the comeback king.” Trump revelled in the election results and made a crack about not seeking the office again – unless the House acts.
“I suspect I won’t be running again unless you say he’s good, we got to figure something else,” he said to laughter. Trump can’t serve more than eight years total.
Biden’s invitation to Trump was intended to illustrate what a peaceful transfer of power should look like, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said. “He is showing by leadership,” she said, declining to disclose any topics on the agenda for discussion. Benjamin Harrison was the only other president to hand over the White House to his predecessor, Grover Cleveland.
Both men have lobbed personal attacks for years against each other. Each has cast the other as unfit for office, with Biden warning voters that Trump was a threat to democracy and Trump saying for months that the president was mentally incompetent. Trump also seized on the legal and personal problems of Hunter Biden, the president’s son.
Since Trump’s victory, Biden has said he wants to ensure a smooth transition and called Trump after the election to congratulate him on his win. “Setbacks are unavoidable, but giving up is unforgivable,” Biden said in remarks from the White House Rose Garden last week after the election. “We lost this battle. The America of your dreams is calling for you to get back up.” Trump has wasted no time in announcing many cabinet nominations and top White House positions, rewarding loyalty in his choices.
He selected Susie Wiles, co-chair of his campaign, to serve as his chief of staff. He has also asked Rep. Mike Waltz (R., Fla.) to be his national security adviser; South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem to lead the Department of Homeland Security; John Ratcliffe to be Central Intelligence Agency director; Tom Homan to serve as ” border tsar”; Stephen Miller to be deputy chief of staff for policy; Rep. Elise Stefanik (R., N.Y.) to become the next U.S. ambassador to the United Nations; and former GOP politician Lee Zeldin to lead the Environmental Protection Agency.
Matt Bennett, who worked in the Clinton White House and now serves as co-founder of the centrist group Third Way, said even during more acrimonious transitions – such as the one after the 2000 election recount – the meetings between incoming and outgoing presidents are symbolically important.
“It doesn’t do anything substantively,” he said. “It does help underscore the majesty of our democracy, and a gracious hand-off of power is part of our system, and it’s important.” Bennett acknowledged that the tension between the two parties after the 2000 election compared with today was “quaint.” After he met with outgoing President Barack Obama in 2016, Trump said he had “great respect” for the Democrat and said he would seek his counsel while in office.
Trump had previously called him “the worst president in the history of the United States” and was a leading proponent of the false accusation that Obama was born in a foreign country.
Obama, for his part, pledged at the meeting with Trump to do “everything we can to help you succeed.”
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