Joe Biden and Donald Trump will meet on Wednesday in the Oval Office, the White House announced on Saturday.
Trump will take office on 20 January to become the 47th president of the United States, winning the position back for the Republicans after soundly defeating his Democratic rival and the current US vice-president, Kamala Harris, in the 5 November election.
“At President Biden’s invitation, President Biden and President-elect Trump will meet in the Oval Office on Wednesday,” the press secretary, Karine Jean-Pierre, said in a statement.
Such a post-election meeting is traditional between the outgoing and the incoming presidents. It is scheduled for 11am.
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But after Trump lost his bid for re-election in 2020 and then refused to concede to Biden and accept the result, wrongly claiming he had won but had been defrauded out of his victory, he did not host Biden at the White House during the transition in administrations.
Then, on inauguration day, 20 January 2021, Trump also broke with tradition by again not receiving Biden, the 46th president – and his wife, incoming first lady Jill Biden – at the White House for the handover and accompanying them to the swearing-in ceremony outside the US Capitol.
The Trumps left the White House that morning and flew to Florida.
It was only two weeks after thousands of extremist supporters of Trump had broken into the Capitol to try in vain to stop the certification of Biden’s triumph, which led to Trump’s second impeachment, when he was accused of inciting an insurrection.
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Previously, the Obamas followed tradition in 2017 by welcoming Donald and Melania Trump at the White House before accompanying them to Trump’s inauguration, and Barack Obama hosted Trump, the then incoming 45th president, to the Oval Office in late 2016 after he’d defeated Hillary Clinton.
This year, Biden had initially sought re-election but dropped out of the race in July after a disastrous debate against Trump, giving his anointed Democratic successor, Harris, a very short campaign for the presidency.
The Associated Press and Reuters contributed reporting
Source: US Politics - theguardian.com
