With less than a week to go for the inauguration of Joe Biden as the next President of the United States, and after months of denial of Biden’s electoral victory from the sitting President, the White House has started to show signs that Donald Trump is preparing to leave.
According to reports citing photographs taken at the White House, officials were seen carrying items ranging from a bust of Abraham Lincoln, a framed picture of Trump meeting Chinese President Xi Jinping, and other items including a rug, away from 1600, Pennsylvania Avenue.
SPOTTED: Bust of President Abraham Lincoln leaving the West Wing about an hour ago. pic.twitter.com/QOulIk1dQE
— Jeremy Art (@cspanJeremy) January 14, 2021
Trump, who has said he will break with tradition and not attend Biden’s inauguration, nevertheless, conceded the election following the disastrous storming of the US Capitol building on January 6 by his supporters. The event, which may come to define his presidency, led to Congress impeaching Trump for a historic second time and social media platforms uniting to silence Trump on grounds that he had incited violence.
'White House advisor Peter Navarro leaves the West Wing of the White House with a photograph of U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping, in Washington, U.S., January 13, 2021.'
— Michael B. Kelley (@MichaelBKelley) January 14, 2021
📷 by @erinscottphoto pic.twitter.com/0KtzMgvrCF
Trump has since maintained an uncharacteristic silence, either unwillingly or by choice, and his statements since have been carefully scripted—as opposed to his usual freewheeling orations.
People move a rug from the Eisenhower Executive Office Building into their car as workers move boxes in Washington. Photo by @erinscottphoto pic.twitter.com/SjKfNtPhU4
— corinne_perkins (@corinne_perkins) January 14, 2021
The investigation into January 6’s events continues, with federal prosecutors now saying that the rioters intended to capture and assassinate elected officials. Indeed, mobs were heard stating their intentions to hang the Vice President Mike Pence, on the day that he refused to overturn the election results despite repeated pleas to do so by Trump.
On January 21, Biden’s inauguration will take place with over 20,000 troops guarding the national capital—more numbers than that of troops deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan, an unprecedented deployment for a peacetime transition of power in the US.
