US President Donald Trump says he will hand over power to election winner Joe Biden in an orderly fashion. “If it turns out that my opponent has garnered the most electoral votes, I will leave the White House,” Trump told journalists on Thursday.
Never before has Trump so openly acknowledged that he may have to leave the White House. However, he still refuses to acknowledge his loss in the presidential election.
Joe Biden amassed 306 electors in the US presidential election on November 3. Trump got no further than 232 votes in the Electoral College. The 538 electors will vote on December 14.
That vote takes place in their own state, which then forwards the results to the Senate in Washington. The President of the Senate and the archivist must receive the results by December 23.
The official results are then forwarded to the newly formed Congress. The Senate and the House of Representatives will meet for the first time in a new composition in a joint session on 6 January.
Trump insists that fraud has taken place
Trump reiterated against reporters on Thursday the unproven allegations that there was massive fraud in the election. His campaign team, the Republican Party and Trump supporters have launched several recounts demanded and 17 lawsuits in several major swing states since election day, November 3, but the promised successes have yet to materialize.
While those matters differ in details, the intended end goal for the Trump camp is the same: to prevent states from confirming final election results and to prevent Democrat Joe Biden from being elected president by the Electoral College on Dec. 14.
Power transfer process has now begun
Three days ago, the official transition to a new government could begin after the General Service Administration (GSA) finally decided that Biden had won the election, a decision Trump acknowledged.
The GSA’s agreement on the transfer of power is of great practical importance to Biden. That service should give the election winner’s team access to things like office space, equipment and money to pay salaries. This involves millions of dollars.
Whether Trump will attend the inauguration of his successor Joe Biden on January 20 next year, he left open on Thursday. “I know the answer, but I’m not going to tell you yet,” said the outgoing president.
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