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Is that the happy ending? Washington breathes a sigh of relief after the departure of Donald Trump. Nobody knows yet if his followers will come back to reality.
Joe Biden is the president of the White House, Donald Trump is a retiree in Florida, and a new era has begun in Washington.
Corona and the fear of a new Trump mafia made this turning point more lonely and quieter than America really deserved after these four years.
The inauguration on the Capitol turned into an almost intimate event, even if it was guarded by tens of thousands of security guards and broadcast live around the world. Because only a few hundred state representatives, guests of honor, and family members gathered at the scene, in addition to the military band, the Secret Service, and journalists, in folding chairs at a Corona-compatible distance. I was very lucky to be there.
Despite all the journalistic distance that I have to get rid of, the 46th President’s inauguration was simply a wonderful experience. Because it was actually, although it sounds like an empty phrase, a celebration of democracy.
It was as unreal as it was beautiful to sit in the exact spot from where the mob had started storming the Capitol two weeks earlier, spurred on by the loser, with the clear mission of breaking the will of the majority. The fact that the election winner was crowned here seemed like a belated and hard-won triumph.
At the Capitol it snowed in the middle, an icy wind whipped across the stage from the northwest, but that didn’t take away the magic from the ceremony either. American democracy, so heavily under fire, shone in its most beautiful place with its radiant ritual: the peaceful transfer of power at the end. And above was a president who understood the historical moment. He spoke of the fragile democracy and the fact that it had asserted itself at the time. Joe Biden did not speak well.
I won’t soon forget that cold Wednesday on Capitol Hill. Before television stations from around the world were there, the atmosphere in the place was like a class reunion. While the most important representatives sat on the stage above, the second most important and those who were not yet gathered directly below: the members of the House of Representatives, the senators who would not be sworn in until the afternoon, the ministers of Biden waiting for your confirmation. There was a relaxed atmosphere, people were chatting and taking selfies.
I spoke with many guests and each of them expressed their hope for better times. Abigail Spanberger, a Virginia Democrat I once campaigned with, put it this way: “This is a new chapter for America and hopefully for the entire world.”
Behind me sat John Kerry, Obama’s secretary of state and longtime friend of Biden, who will now be the White House climate commissioner and, well, he’s supposed to do nothing less than help save the world. We talked a bit about the situation. Kerry spoke of “America’s return to its obligations in the world” at this time. “That includes respecting and working with other nations as we heal our own nation after a difficult time.”
Kerry said that when it comes to climate, first and foremost, his own country must do more. That was a sentence that was so obviously true and, after the last four years, so outrageous and important that it later made headlines.
In fact, you couldn’t understand this magical moment at all without those four years before.
Everyone has their own story about this Trump era. For most Americans, it was traumatic.
Mine is something like this: I really wanted to experience this unique moment in Washington. But he had no idea how crazy he would get. On my first day of work in Washington, it was January 2018, the world feared that Trump might start a nuclear war with North Korea by tweeting. At the same time, he wanted to cut off all aid money to the Palestinians because they personally did not show him the necessary “respect”. And the preprints of the first reveal book, Fire and Fury, made the nation question Trump’s sanity.
It was just a prelude to what was to come. My days were unpredictable, dependent on the whims of a president who upset all schedules with a tweet in the morning in a bathrobe. It was exciting as a correspondent for a while. But at some point the consequences became more and more notorious and serious: the shaking of the separation of powers and democracy, the sowing and harvesting of hatred, the constant lies.
In 2020 it all ended in a gloomy crescendo: The president downplayed and ignored the pandemic so much that it became a health hazard to all who interacted with or listened to it, and inoculated millions of good believers in the stolen election conspiracy. 2020 with Trump was not only exhausting, but also often unhealthy and depressing.
In short: it was too much.
So I look forward to the new era. The contrasts with the Trump era could not be overlooked on Wednesday itself. Masks were worn, speeches were infused with a new sound that brought decency to the fore, and seven hours after taking office the first press conference was held. Something monstrous happened: it was politics. On plans and personal data, not on insults and fairy tales.
In the old days, informational meetings oozed lies and mutual contempt, if they ever happened. Now he saw himself in the small press room at the White House: respect. PKs should be available every day in the future.
Is everything going to be okay now? Of course not. Part of Trump’s legacy is that a large chunk of citizens will never recognize Biden as the rightful president (incidentally, that wasn’t all that different from Trump at the time), but the challenges with the crown, the economic crisis and trustworthy are already big enough. .
Some of the Republicans have succumbed to Trump’s fantasies and rules of the cosmos for the foreseeable future., driven by a partial audience that seeks salvation by moving away from reality. And no one knows what the Democrats will actually achieve with their slim majority. The impeachment process that is still pending should not help defuse the situation.
Now the really exciting moment begins. Does the image that I internalized from so many lectures while I was studying American Studies still apply: that American history is pendulum-like, that after an extreme period of time there is always a strong correction? Or did the Trump era also nullify this natural law and the insanity has taken hold so deeply that the struggle against reality and the war of positions between the two sides simply continues?
All of this will become more apparent from next week. These days are still those to celebrate and be surprised with the new time. To get used to the combination of words: US President Joe Biden, US Vice President Kamala Harris.
Just one piece of advice I’d like to give you: don’t underestimate the new man in the White House. Even if it doesn’t often seem like that in the 78-year-old’s appearances: Joe Biden is a pro with a clear plan who hardly made a mistake on the campaign trail. Now he has the job he wanted all his life.
Meanwhile, nothing is heard of the former president, whose moods and insanity have shaped almost every day of my life for the past few years. He’s sitting in Mar-a-Lago without a Twitter account and I have no idea what he’s been up to or getting out of there since Wednesday. And between us: for this moment, perhaps brief, but perhaps also longer, I don’t care.
