United States President Donald Trump left the White House Wednesday morning, boarding the presidential helicopter Marine One at 8:20 a.m. (13:20 GMT).
Washington.- Trump briefly spoke to reporters calling his term the "honor of a lifetime" and an "amazing four years" before boarding the helicopter in route to a farewell ceremony at Joint Base Andrews, before flying to Florida.
The departure came less than four hours before Joe Biden became the country’s 46th president. Capping off a presidency that prided itself on bucking modern political norms, Trump ended his four-year stay at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue with one final breach of decorum as he became the first president in more than 150 years to skip his successor’s inauguration.
He did adhere to one tradition of an outgoing president: leaving a note for his successor. He left one in the Oval Office for Joe Biden, according to news reports. An aide dropped off the note, Bloomberg News reported, as Trump did not go to the Oval Office Wednesday morning.
The real estate-mogul-turned-businessman-turned-president instead has maintained that November’s election was “rigged” and “stolen” from him – claims that were found to have no basis in reality despite numerous court challenges, audits and recounts.
While failing to overturn the results, Trump’s defiant campaign of misinformation did leave a mark. Rioters egged on by the president breached the U.S. Capitol as Congress met to certify Biden’s victory on January 6. Five people were killed in the violence.
In an extraordinary moment on Tuesday, Trump’s last full day in office, Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell explicitly placed the blame at Trump’s feet, saying the rioters were “fed lies” and were “provoked by the president and other powerful people”.
As Trump was lifted from Joint Base Andrews, the country continued to brace for further violence by “domestic extremists” that federal authorities warned could target Washington, DC, and the capitals of all 50 U.S. states.
The storming of the seat of the U.S. legislature this month, the first time since 1814, could also derail Trump’s future political ambitions; as a single-term president, he would be eligible to run for a second term in 2024. (RHC)