WASHINGTON – With another 13 days in office, President Donald Trump finally bowed to reality on Thursday amid growing talk of trying to force him to leave early, acknowledging that he would leave peacefully after Congress confirmed his defeat.
Trump led a video from the White House by condemning the violence in his name at the Capitol a day earlier. Then, for the first time on camera, he admitted that his presidency would end soon – although he refused to name the elected president Joe Biden or explicitly declare that he had lost.
“A new administration will be inaugurated on January 20,” Trump said in the video. “My focus now is to ensure a smooth, orderly and seamless transition of power. This moment calls for healing and reconciliation. ”
The address, apparently designed to ward off talk of forced early eviction, came at the end of a day when the corner president remained out of sight in the White House. Silenced on some of his favorite internet lines, he looks to the resignation of several top assistants, including two cabinet secretaries.
And when officials sifted through the aftermath of the siege of the U.S. Capitol pro-Trump mob, there was growing discussion to accuse him a second time or call for the 25th Amendment to expel him from the Oval Office.
The invasion of the Capitol building, a powerful symbol of the country’s democracy, struck Republicans and Democrats alike. They have struggled to contain the impulses of a president who is considered too dangerous to control his own social media accounts, but who is still the commander – in – chief of the world’s largest army.
“I’m not worried about the next election, I’m worried about getting through the next 14 days,” said Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, one of Trump’s strongest allies. He condemned the president’s role in Wednesday’s riots and said: “If something else happens, all options will be on the table.”
Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi stated that “the President of the United States has incited an armed uprising against America”. She calls him ‘a very dangerous person who should not continue in office. It is urgent, an emergency of the highest magnitude. ‘
No single option to remove Trump was likely, with little time in his term, to draft the cabinet members needed to call for the amendment or to organize the hearings and trial required for an indictment. But the fact that the dramatic options were even the subject of discussion in Washington’s power lines was a warning to Trump.
Fear of what a desperate president could do in his last days in the country’s capital and beyond, including speculation, could trump Trump into more violence, make appointments, issue ill-considered apologies – even to himself and his family – or even a destabilizing factor causes international incident.
The president’s video Thursday – which was released on his return to Twitter after his account was restored – was a complete reversal of the one he put out just 24 hours earlier in which he told the violent mob: ‘We love your. You are very special. “His refusal to condemn the violence sparked a storm of criticism and in the new video he finally exposed the protesters’ ‘lawlessness and chaos’.
As for his feelings when he left office, he told the country that ‘it was the honor of my lifetime to serve as your president’, while pointing to returning to the public arena. He told fans “our incredible journey is only just beginning.”
Just a day earlier, Trump had unleashed the destructive forces at the Capitol with his unfounded allegations of electoral fraud during a rally that prompted supporters to disrupt the certification of Biden’s victory of Congress. Following the storming of the Capitol and the eventual certification of Biden’s victory by members of Congress, Trump issued a statement acknowledging that he would abide by a peaceful transfer of power on January 20.
The statement was made by an assistant and does not come from the president’s own Twitter account, which has 88 million followers and has been used for four years as a political weapon that determines policy and sows division and conspiracy.
Trump could not tweet it himself because the social media platform suspended his account for the first time, saying the president had violated his rules of service by inciting violence. Facebook has accepted a broader ban, saying Trump’s account will be offline until after Biden’s inauguration.
Deprived of the social media lifeline, Trump remained silent until Thursday night and locked himself in the executive mansion. But around him, loyalists headed for the exits. Their departure – which would come in two weeks anyway – moves up to protest the president’s handling of the riot.
Transport Secretary Elaine Chao became the first cabinet member to resign. Chao, married to Senate Leader Mitch McConnell, one of the lawmakers trapped in the Capitol on Wednesday, said in a message to staff that the attack made me a serious problem in a way I simply can not set aside. ‘
Education Secretary Betsy DeVos followed. In her resignation letter on Thursday, DeVos blamed Trump for inciting tensions in the violent assault on the seat of the country’s democracy. “The impact your rhetoric has had on the situation is wrong, and that’s the turning point for me,” she wrote.
Others who resigned following the riot: Deputy National Security Adviser Matthew Pottinger; Ryan Tully, senior director for European and Russian affairs at the National Security Council; and First Lady Melania Trump’s chief of staff Stephanie Grisham, a former White House press secretary.
Mick Mulvaney, the former chief of staff of Trump who became special envoy to Northern Ireland, told CNBC that he had called Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to let him know I was resigning. … I can ‘t do that. I can not stay. ”
Mulvaney said others working for Trump have decided to stay in their posts in an effort to provide some sort of backing for the president during his last days in office.
“Those who prefer to stay, and I’ve talked to some of them, choose to stay because they’re worried the president might make someone worse,” Mulvaney said.
Mulvaney’s predecessor in the post of chief of staff, retired US Marine Corps general John Kelly, told CNN that “I think the cabinet should meet and have a discussion” on Article 4 of the 25th Amendment – which is the powerful removal of Trump through his own cabinet. .
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer joined Pelosi, declaring that Trump “should not hold a day longer” and called on Vice President Mike Pence and the cabinet to act. But Chao’s departure could hamper efforts to make the change.
According to two people who were informed about the discussions, discussions took place at staff level across different departments and even in parts of the White House. But no cabinet member has publicly expressed support for the move – which would make Pence the acting president – although several people believe they understand the idea, believing Trump is too erratic in his declining days in office.
In the West Wing, shock-shocked helpers were packing up, according to a delayed order to tackle before their arrival from the Biden team. The slowdown in the past was due to Trump’s idiosyncratic focus on his defeat since election day at the expense of the other responsibilities of his office.
It is the most glaring, including the fight against the raging coronavirus that kills the record number of Americans every day.
Few assistants had any idea of the president’s plans, and some wondered if Trump would remain largely out of sight until he left the White House. White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany read a brief statement in which she stated that the siege of the Capitol was “abominable, reprehensible and antithetical in the American way”.
But her words carry little weight. Trump has long shown that only he speaks for his presidency.
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Lemire reports from New York. Associated Press author Jill Colvin contributed reports from Washington.