Signaling that he’d like 74-year-old President Donald Trump to attend his inauguration Jan. 20, 2021, President-elect Joe Biden extended the president an olive branch, hoping that he’d honor an age-old U.S. tradition. Since President George Washington handed the baton to John Adams, American presidents graciously extended invitations to their predecessors, something Biden would like to continue. Whether that happens this time around is anyone’s guess. Trump isn’t finished filing lawsuits trying to contest the election but things will change on Dec. 14 when the Electoral College meets to confirm Biden’s 306 Electoral votes to Trump’s 232, making it official. By that time, Trump will have called in the movers to relocate him to his Palm Beach, Fl. Mar a Lago golf resort. Right now, Trump’s in no mood to concede the election let alone give up his legal battle to overturn the election.
Trump understands, as a career businessman, that his legal challenges will run out soon, leaving him some choices about conceding the election and attending Biden’s inauguration. Media reports have discussed whether or not Trump would run again in 2024, something so improbable, it’s falls into the likelihood to getting struck by lightening on a cloudless summer day. While Trump’s 74 million supporters haven’t given up yet with the fantasy of seeing Trump run again, it’s not likely that he’ll be in any shape to run in four years. Beyond his health, the public had a chance to reelect Trump in 2020, choosing Biden instead. Whatever fraud existed in the vote, it wasn’t enough to change the election, according to Atty. Gen. Bill Barr. Trump asked Barr yesterday at the White House to redouble his efforts to see if voter fraud resulted in him losing the election.
Barr’s in no position to ascertain facts related to voting precincts around the country that tabulated the Nov. 3 vote. Nor is any court, local, state or federal, able to rerun a presidential election. With recounts in some key battle ground states changing nothing, the handwriting is on the walls that Biden won the 2020 presidential race by about 7 million popular votes, sending clear message to Trump that he was rejected by a plurality of U.S. voters. Beaten by nearly 5%, 51.4% to 46.9%, Trump political days are over for the foreseeable future. Whatever nostalgia remains for Trump’s fans, they’ll have to move on just like the president. When the Electoral College certifies the vote Dec. 14, Trump will grow more receptive to attending Biden’s Inauguration Day, realizing that it’s part of a historical record, something that can’t be taken away from his four years in office.
Whatever the future holds for the U.S. in the age of Covid-19, Biden’s new administration will stumble along, hoping that vaccines developed under Trump’s Operation Warp speed help to end the novel coronavirus plague that upended Trump’s presidency. Trump was despised by the U.S. media, largely because he embarrassed them in 2016, beating 72-year-old former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. Coining the term “fake news” for posterity, the American public will never look at the U.S. press the same way again. At no time in U.S. history did the press take clear sides in the election doing everything possible to defeat Trump. Trump was so demonized for four years of negative reporting, he became the personification of evil, a menace the public had to stop to preserve the Republic. Trump found out the hard way he couldn’t run against the press and Biden at the same time.
Biden wants to show the world that once the game is over, were can all shake hands as good sports. “Important in the sense that we are able to demonstrate, at the end of the chaos he created, that there is a peaceful transfer of power, with the competing parties standing there, shaking hands and moving on,” Biden said. Biden’s face-to-face encounter with Trump at two presidential debates was more than he could handle, especially the first debate Sept. 29 in Cleveland. Little did anyone know then, Trump probably was infected with Covid-19 at the debate, getting his diagnosis Oct. 3. Hospitalized with coronavirus pulled the rug out from underneath Trump’s campaign, demonstrating for all to see that Trump didn’t take the Covid-19 seriously. Biden’s campaign team rode Trump’s mismanagement of the coronavirus all the way to the White House. Getting Covid-19 ended Trump’s bid for a second term.
Throwing out the olive branching inviting Trump to attend the inauguration, Biden wants to put the bitter campaign behind him. While members of the media continue to stir the pot, Biden’s shown some grace-under-pressure while he assembles his Cabinet and staffs his government. “The protocol of the transfer of power, I think, is important,” Biden said. “But its is totally his decision, and it’s—its of no personal consequence to me. But I do think it is for our country,” making the point that Trump’s presence proves the U.S. is still the “last best hope for man on earth,” paraphrasing Presidents Abraham Lincoln and Ronald Reagan. When the Electoral College finishes its work Dec. 14, Trump will start to put the election behind him, looking ahead to his place in history. He knows that making another run at age 78 would be a real long shot, if he’s even around four years from now.
