2020 U.S. elections: with President Trump the day he lost

For the past four years, I have seen President Donald Trump through good days and bad. But November 7, the day he lost the election, was a day like no other.

Wearing a black jacket, dark pants and a white MAGA (Make America Great Again) hat, the 45th president left the White House a few minutes before 10:00. He spent the beginning of his day cheep on electoral fraud.

Now his step leaned slightly forward, as if blocking the force of the winds. Trump got into the dark car and headed to his golf club, Trump National in Sterling, Virginia, about 25 miles (40 km) from the White House.

At that moment, he exuded an atmosphere of trust. It’s a good day, perfect for golfing, and your brother will spend the day at the club.

But the people who work for him seem to be in danger.

“How are you?” I asked one of the subordinates.

“Okay,” he said. She smiled, but narrowed her eyes. She looked at her phone.

The White House has experienced a series of traumas in the days after the election. Just on Tuesday, it felt like this place had been through a lifetime.

Many of the desks in the west wing were empty when I passed the building on a Saturday morning. Some staff members became infected with the corona virus and left the office. Others are in quarantine.

Then, starting at 11:30 a.m., while the president was at his golf club, the BBC and American news agencies began naming Joe Biden, Trump’s Democratic rival. choice.

I was sitting in an Italian restaurant about a mile from the club when I heard the news. I am a member of the White House press group, a small group of journalists who accompany the president. We were all waiting for him to leave the club.

“It’s so poisonous,” said a woman outside the restaurant, who, like most of her neighbors in the area, are Democrats.

Others wonder when the club president will leave and return to the White House. Minutes passed and hours passed.

“He’s being slow,” a law enforcement officer told his colleague.

The president is in no rush to leave. At the club, he met with friends. Outside the door, supporters yelled at me and other journalists: “End of the media!”

A woman in sturdy-looking high heels and a red-white-blue scarf carries a sign that says “Stop stealing.”

A man was driving a truck with flags up and down the street in front of the club, including one that showed the president standing on a tank, as if he were the commander of the world.

It shows how Trump supporters view him and how he has viewed himself for the past four years.

Finally, he left the club and began his journey home.

His critics have been waiting: thousands of people.

The presidential convoy was honking its horn in Virginia, the truck that was taking me in that convoy almost crashed on Fairfax County Parkway. The siren roared.

The closer they got to the White House, the bigger the crowd: people flocked to the streets to celebrate their defeat. Someone raised a sign: “You lose and we all win.”

They all honked and scoffed.

After that, we went back to the White House. The president enters through the side door, a passage that presidents rarely use. His shoulders hunched, his head bowed.

He glanced sideways and saw me and the others in the press group waving. It was a rather nonchalant gesture, he did not raise his hand or move or raise his fist as usual.

Whether in the White House or at the golf club, the president never wavered: He made unfounded statements about voter fraud and he would find justice.

Trump tweeted in the morning about the votes “illegally received” and, late in the afternoon, bluntly announced in capital letters: “I AM A WINNER.”

But it was Mr. Trump on Twitter. The man I see before my eyes leaves another impression. When he walked through the side door of the White House in the late afternoon, the arrogance was gone.