It seems the Democratic President Joe Biden, who had vainly sought to defeat his Republican predecessor Donald Trump again, has grudgingly offered an invitation to the former President to return to the White House, albeit for a brief time. It’s a strange spectacle indeed, considering that Biden has already ousted Trump once in 2020. In an almost petty act, Trump had offered no such reciprocation to Biden, choosing to leave Washington before the Jan. 20, 2021, inauguration. The move was unprecedented since Andrew Johnson skipped the 1869 swearing-in of Ulysses S. Grant.
Biden having beaten Trump once and then running against him for about 15 months in this year’s campaign is a bizarre turn of events. Interestingly, their Wednesday meeting in the Oval Office marks the first time since 1992 that an outgoing president sits down with his competitor from the preceding campaign. That year, Republican President George H.W. Bush met with President-elect Bill Clinton, a Democrat, post-election to discuss policy. The meeting ending in a joint visit to the Roosevelt Room with their transition staff.
Over time, the hand-off ceremonies between exiting presidents and their successors have proved to be a fascinating canvas of the country’s political climate — everything from cordial to strained and every shade in-between. On his part, Biden has pledged to ensure a ‘smooth transition’ and stressed on the need to cooperate with Trump, who is both his presidential forerunner and successor, with the lofty claim of uniting the country.
The invitation from Biden to Trump also includes the former First Lady, Melania Trump. The President-elect claims he ‘looks forward to the meeting.’ Given Trump’s previous term and political acumen, this encounter won’t be entirely foreign territory for him.
In what could be considered a practice round, Trump and then-President Barack Obama held an extended 90-minute dialogue in the Oval Office shortly after the 2016 election. White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough also familiarized Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner with the West Wing. Rarely seen adopting a subdued tone, Trump dubbed Obama ‘a good man’ and honored the meeting as a ‘great privilege.’ He voiced ‘significant respect’ for Obama and stated that they ‘discussed a multitude of scenarios, some rewarding, and others challenging.’
The formal transition protocol doesn’t necessitate presidents extending invitations for personal meetings to their successors, although it can pass off as an unwritten norm. Historical records make no mention of George Washington arranging a ceremonial meeting with John Adams, the nation’s second president, before his departure from New York, the then-capital.
Further initiating a tradition of spurning his successor, Adams never invited Thomas Jefferson, his political adversary and eventual successor, to the White House during his term. He left without gracing Jefferson’s inauguration in 1801, marking a seemingly petty departure.
Nevertheless, by 1841, a more gracious example was set when President Martin Van Buren welcomed President-elect William Henry Harrison, despite a brutal electoral defeat. Van Buren even offered a selfless proposal to vacate the official residence early to accommodate his successor, after Washington’s National Hotel, where Harrison was lodged, became congested. Harrison, however, opted for a brief pre-inaugural trip to Virginia.
In a more recent display of begrudged courtesy, George W. Bush, a Republican, hosted Obama at the White House in 2008. This happened after Bush hailed the election of the nation’s first Black president as a ‘triumph of the American story.’ A mere eight years prior, Bush himself was a newcomer meeting with the outgoing Clinton, who had denied his father a second term.
Their conversation occurred just days after the Supreme Court resolved the disputed 2000 election. Interestingly, Bush also later visited the vice-presidential residence to briefly engage with none other than Al Gore, the man he overcame in a heated and controversial election. The irony of such encounters, marking transitions fraught with inherent tension, certainly adds a rich tapestry to the history of American politics.