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United States President Donald Trump walks into the Oval Office as he returns to the White House on December 31, 2020 in Washington, DC. Tasos Katopodis / Getty Images / AFP
WEST PALM BEACH – President Donald Trump ended his vacation at his Florida resort on Thursday, isolated, angry and with his power slipping away.
Two months after losing the US presidential election to Joe Biden, Trump, 74, still refuses to admit defeat.
He spent the past eight days at his Mar-a-Lago resort playing golf, sending angry tweets and making little pretense of ruling the country.
Trump expanded his tweeted insults beyond his usual targets, the “fake news” media and the Democrats.
The Supreme Court, three of whose justices it appointed? “Totally incompetent and weak.”
Leaders of your Republican Party? “Pathetic.”
The Republican Governor of Georgia? “A complete disaster.”
Other vitriol targets include the FBI, your attorney general, and The Wall Street Journal editorial page, to begin with.
During his vacation, Trump surprisingly had nothing to say to the White House group of a dozen journalists who accompanied him to the Sunshine State.
The silence was a stark contrast to the past four years, during which Trump has thrived on give and take with journalists.
On the White House lawn, under the wing of Air Force One, on red carpets and elsewhere, Trump has rarely been able to resist the lure of the television cameras and microphones that await him.
In late 2020, mom is the word.
After years of proudly displaying bills and decrees he had just signed for cameras, Trump on Sunday signed a massive coronavirus relief package out of public view.
Trump had initially threatened to veto the long-awaited $ 900 billion stimulus bill, passed with bipartisan support, before finally backing down and signing it without receiving any concessions.
20 days
Lasting images of Trump’s latest presidential vacation will be photographs of him taken from a distance, playing golf in a white polo shirt and a red “Make America Great Again” baseball cap.
The White House had insisted that while Trump had no public events planned in Mar-a-Lago, he would be working “tirelessly for the American people.”
“His schedule includes a lot of meetings and calls,” he said.
At a time when the United States, like many other countries, is facing a sharp increase in coronavirus cases, Trump had nothing to say about the pandemic except to blame state officials for the delays in vaccine distribution.
On its penultimate day in Florida, the United States saw a record 3,927 deaths in the space of 24 hours.
Trump returned to Washington Thursday afternoon, cutting his vacation short by one day and skipping the traditional glitzy New Year’s Eve party at Mar-a-Lago.
He did not speak to reporters upon his departure or arrival, but posted a video on Twitter shortly after his return touting his accomplishments during his four years in office.
He did not mention the election.
Trump has 20 days left in the White House, and questions arise about what he can do in his final days in office.
Who will he forgive next? Will you be attending Biden’s opening ceremony on January 20?
Nobody knows. But it is clear that his desperate efforts to overturn the results of the November 3 election are doomed and his influence is waning.
Senator Mitch McConnell, the powerful Republican Majority Leader in the Senate, acknowledged Biden’s victory and flatly rejected Trump’s demand to increase direct payments of Covid-19 aid to Americans.
And a newspaper that has been one of Trump’s most ardent supporters, the New York Post, told him it was time to give in.
“Stop the Insanity,” the Post, owned by Rupert Murdoch, said in a headline on Monday.
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