Biden, Trump Promise Peaceful Transition During Oval Office Meeting

WASHINGTON — President Joe Biden and President-elect Donald Trump met for a “very cordial” two hours on Wednesday, setting the stage for what both promised would be a “smooth” transition after a sometimes bruising 2024 election cycle.

The post-election meeting of the outgoing and incoming president at the White House is a longstanding American tradition. However, this year’s meeting had all the makings of an awkward encounter.

In 2020, after Biden drove Trump from office, the Republican notably did not invite his successor to the White House and even left Washington before the Jan. 20, 2021, inauguration.

In slighting Biden four years ago, Trump became the first president to dispense with the tradition since Andrew Johnson avoided the swearing-in of Ulysses S. Grant in 1869.

Both Biden and Trump were all smiles as they sat before a roaring fire as pool reporters and photographers were briefly let into the Oval Office at the start of their meeting.

“Congratulations, and I look forward to having a smooth transition, and making sure that you are accommodated with whatever you need,” Biden said while shaking Trump’s hand.

“Thank you very much,” Trump said. “Politics is tough, and in many cases, it’s not a nice world, but it is a nice world today and I appreciate it very much.”

He then went on to say he believes the transition will be “so smooth” that it will be “as smooth as it can get.”

“And I very much appreciate that too,” Trump said.

Biden, of course, only ran against Trump for about 14 months this time around, before stepping aside and endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris for president.

Throughout the race, Biden and other Democrats repeatedly assailed Trump as “a threat to democracy” and a disruptor of the core values of the nation. Trump hit back hard, repeatedly hurling personal insults and invective at his Democratic opponents.

All of that appeared to be in the rearview mirror Wednesday.

During a briefing with reporters about 45 minutes after Trump left the Oval Office, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre described the sessions as “very cordial, very gracious and substantive.”

In addition to the president and the president-elect, the meeting was also attended by the current White House chief of staff, Jeff Zients, and incoming chief of staff Susie Wiles.

“They discussed important national security and domestic policy issues facing the nation, and President Biden also raised the issue of important items on Congress’ to-do list during the lame duck session, including funding the government and providing the disaster supplemental funding the president requests,” Jean-Pierre said.

“The president-elect was gracious and came with a detailed set of questions,” she continued, adding that Biden reiterated what he said last week in the Rose Garden about the need for there to be an “orderly transition” and “a peaceful transition of power.”

“The president respects the will of the American people and wants to make sure that occurs,” Jean-Pierre said. “It’s what he believes the American people deserve.”

While Biden and Trump spoke, nearly 100 reporters and photographers waited outside the West Wing, hoping the president-elect would make his way to “the sticks,” the microphones set up on the White House driveway directly outside the building’s entrance, or at least poke his head outside and wave.

Cameras clicked and necks craned expectedly every time the Marine guard at the door opened it to let somebody out, but none of those somebodies turned out to be Trump.

The mass of humanity only dispersed when a colleague of one of the waiting photographers, standing at Pennsylvania Avenue and 15th Street, noted that a motorcycle police escort had formed at the gate and streets were being closed to facilitate Trump’s departure.

By then hundreds of people were gathered at the intersection, as eager as the press, to catch a glimpse of the once and future president.

Among them was Matthew Hurtt, chairman of the Arlington County, Virginia, Republican Party, who had shown up hours earlier to express his support for Trump.

“I’m pretty excited about this,” he told The Well News. “I see it as an opportunity for President-elect Trump to meet with President Biden and identify ways to unify the country.”

Asked for his take on the election itself, Hurtt called the results a huge — “and pretty shocking, frankly” — mandate for an America First agenda.

“I’m really excited about the opportunity our party has to govern for the next several years,” he said.

Asked finally about Trump’s ever-growing list of nominees for his administration, Hurtt said he was gratified to see the incoming Trump administration “working quickly to identify qualified, competent people — including some people from inside the government and some people who are not inside the government.”

“I think that’s a good mix,” the county GOP chairman said. “And I think he’ll be able to hit the ground running on day one to advance the agenda that he has four more years to advance.”

Dan can be reached at [email protected] and @DanMcCue