Donald Trump says he will leave White House if electoral
college votes for Joe Biden
Martin Farrer and
agencies
Thu 26 Nov 2020 18.16 EST
President’s
comments are the closest he has come to admitting defeat in election and set
stage for college vote on 14 December
VIDEO
:
Trump
says he will leave White House if electoral college votes against him – video
Donald Trump has said that he will leave the White
House in January if the electoral college votes for Democratic president-elect
Joe Biden, in the closest the outgoing president has come to conceding defeat.
Biden won the
presidential election with
306 electoral college votes – many more than the 270 required –
to Trump’s 232. Biden also leads Trump by more than 6 million in the popular
vote tally.
Trump has so far defied
tradition by refusing to concede defeat, instead making a series of baseless
claims about alleged ballot fraud and launching legal attempts to challenge the
outcomes in several states such Pennsylvania and Michigan.
But desperate efforts by
Trump and his aides to overturn results in key states, either by lawsuits or by
pressuring state legislators, have failed.
Speaking to reporters on
the Thanksgiving holiday, Trump said if Biden – who is due to be sworn in on 20
January – was certified the election winner by the electoral college, he would
depart the White House.
Trump’s comments, made to
reporters at the White House after speaking to troops during the traditional
Thanksgiving Day address to US service members, appear to take him one step
nearer to admitting defeat.
Asked if he would leave
the White House if the college vote went against him, Trump said: “Certainly I
will. And you know that,” adding that: “If they do, they’ve made a mistake.”
Donald Trump
arrives for the event on Thursday night. Photograph: Erin Scott/Reuters
However, Trump said it
would be “a very hard thing to concede” and declined to say whether he would
attend Biden’s inauguration, which is due to take place on 20 January.
It was the first time he
had taken questions from reporters since election day, and at times he turned
combative, calling one reporter a “lightweight” and telling him “don’t talk to
me like that”.
Trump’s administration
has already given the green light for a formal transition to get underway. But
Trump took issue with Biden moving forward.
“I think it’s not right
that he’s trying to pick a Cabinet,” Trump said, even though officials from
both teams are already working together to get Biden’s team up to speed.
At one point he urged
reporters not to allow Biden the credit for pending coronavirus vaccines.
“Don’t let him take
credit for the vaccines because the vaccines were me and I pushed people harder
than they’ve ever been pushed before,” he said.
As for whether or not he
plans to formally declare his candidacy to run again in 2024 – as he has discussed
with aides – Trump he didn’t “want to talk about 2024 yet.”
In late-night tweets,
Trump complained that the media had not covered his news conference in the way
he had wanted, saying the main point he had tried to make was that he
won the election. Twitter flagged his comments.
The electoral college is
due to meet on 14 December when each state’s nominated electors will cast their
votes for the winner of the state’s presidential ballot. The votes are
officially counted by Congress on 6 January.
When asked about Trump’s
comments, Biden campaign spokesperson, Michael Gwin said: “President-elect
Biden won 306 electoral votes. States continue to certify those results, the
Electoral College will soon meet to ratify that outcome,” adding: “Biden will
be sworn in as President on January 20, 2021.”
Showing that he intends
to stay in the political fray until the end of his term, Trump said on Thursday
he would travel on 5 December to Georgia, a once solidly Republican state he
lost narrowly to Biden, to campaign for two Republican Senate candidates.
The two runoff elections
in Georgia on 5 January will determine whether the Republicans keep their
majority in the Senate.
Biden and Trump both
stayed close to home to celebrate Thanksgiving as the coronavirus pandemic
raged across the country.
Biden spent the holiday
with his family in Delaware, giving a presidential-style address in a message
posted on Twitter. He said Americans were making a “shared sacrifice for the
whole country” and a “statement of common purpose” by staying at home with
their immediate families.
Trump often likes to
celebrate holidays at his Mar-a-Largo resort in Florida. But on Thursday he
remained in the Washington area, spending part of the morning at his Trump
National Golf Club in Virginia where he played a round of golf.
The US is rapidly approaching
13m confirmed Covid-19 infections, and by Thursday more than 263,000
people in the country had lost their lives to coronavirus.
Reuters and Associated Press contributed to this
report
No comments:
Post a Comment