Donald
Trump
Donald Trump says he will leave White House if
electoral college votes for Joe Biden
President’s comments are the closest he has come to
admitting defeat in election and set stage for college vote on 14 December
Martin
Farrer and agencies
Thu 26 Nov
2020 23.16 GMTLast modified on Fri 27 Nov 2020 05.50 GMT
Donald
Trump has said that he will leave the White House when the electoral college
votes for Democratic president-elect Joe Biden in the closest the outgoing
president has come to conceding defeat.
Biden won
the presidential election with 306 electoral college votes – many more than the
270 required – to Trump’s 232. Biden also leads Trump by more than 6 million in
the popular vote tally.
Trump has
so far defied tradition by refusing to concede defeat, instead making a series
of baseless claims about alleged ballot fraud and launching legal attempts to
challenge the outcomes in several states such Pennsylvania and Michigan.
But
desperate efforts by Trump and his aides to overturn results in key states,
either by lawsuits or by pressuring state legislators, have failed.
Speaking to
reporters on the Thanksgiving holiday, Trump said if Biden – who is due to be
sworn in on 20 January – was certified the election winner by the electoral
college, he would depart the White House.
Trump’s
comments, made to reporters at the White House after speaking to troops during
the traditional Thanksgiving Day address to US service members, appear to take
him one step nearer to admitting defeat.
Asked if he
would leave the White House if the college vote went against him, Trump said:
“Certainly I will. And you know that,” adding that: “If they do, they’ve made a
mistake.”
However,
Trump said it would be “a very hard thing to concede” and declined to say
whether he would attend Biden’s inauguration, which is due to take place on 20
January.
It was the
first time he had taken questions from reporters since election day, and at
times he turned combative, calling one reporter a “lightweight” and telling him
“don’t talk to me like that”.
Trump’s
administration has already given the green light for a formal transition to get
underway. But Trump took issue with Biden moving forward.
“I think
it’s not right that he’s trying to pick a Cabinet,” Trump said, even though
officials from both teams are already working together to get Biden’s team up
to speed.
At one point
he urged reporters not to allow Biden the credit for pending coronavirus
vaccines.
“Don’t let
him take credit for the vaccines because the vaccines were me and I pushed
people harder than they’ve ever been pushed before,” he said.
As for
whether or not he plans to formally declare his candidacy to run again in 2024
– as he has discussed with aides – Trump he didn’t “want to talk about 2024
yet.”
The
electoral college is due to meet on 14 December when each state’s nominated
electors will cast their votes for the winner of the state’s presidential
ballot. The votes are officially counted by Congress on 6 January.
When asked
about Trump’s comments, Biden campaign spokesperson, Michael Gwin said:
“President-elect Biden won 306 electoral votes. States continue to certify
those results, the Electoral College will soon meet to ratify that outcome,”
adding: “Biden will be sworn in as President on January 20, 2021.”
Showing
that he intends to stay in the political fray until the end of his term, Trump
said on Thursday he would travel on 5 December to Georgia, a once solidly
Republican state he lost narrowly to Biden, to campaign for two Republican
Senate candidates.
The two
runoff elections in Georgia on 5 January will determine whether the Republicans
keep their majority in the Senate.
Biden and
Trump both stayed close to home to celebrate Thanksgiving as the coronavirus
pandemic raged across the country.
Biden spent
the holiday with his family in Delaware, giving a presidential-style address in
a message posted on twitter. He said Americans were making a “shared sacrifice
for the whole country” and a “statement of common purpose” by staying at home
with their immediate families.
Trump often
likes to celebrate holidays at his Mar-a-Largo resort in Florida. But on
Thursday he remained in the Washington area, spending part of the morning at
his Trump National Golf Club in Virginia where he played a round of golf.
The US is
rapidly approaching 13m confirmed Covid-19 infections, and by Thursday more
than 263,000 people in the country had lost their lives to coronavirus.
Reuters and
Associated Press contributed to this report
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