Trump in Mar-a-Lago: eight days of golf, tweets and anger
Entrenched in his gigantic villa in Florida, still contesting the victory of Joe Biden, the American president seems to live a difficult end of reign.
Lonely end of the year for Donald Trump. And end of term with a bitter taste.
For his last vacation in Mar-a-Lago (Florida) as President of the United States, he offered the spectacle of a man turned in on himself, angry, seeming to have given up all inclination to govern but rejecting the idea to give way on the stage.
Volley attacks
The one who still refuses, almost two months after the election, to accept his loss to Joe Biden, has divided his days in the sun between rounds of golf and angry tweets.
He distributed the beatings and insults, going far beyond his traditional targets of the media and the Democrats.
The Supreme Court, of which he appointed three of the nine judges? "Incompetent and weak". The tenors of the Republican Party, his party? "Pathetic". The Republican Governor of Georgia? "A complete disaster". The FBI and the Department of Justice? "They didn't do their job." The editorials of the Wall Stret Journal? "Boring and inconsistent".
Notably, he has not exchanged a single word with the "pool", the group of a dozen journalists who accompany him on all his travels.
The contrast was stark with the past four years in which he has shown how fond he is of media interactions.
Discreetly
Under the wing of Air Force One before climbing the stairs, on a red carpet, or at a ceremony, he often asked questions, provoked the exchange. Not at the end of 2020.
He, who, throughout his mandate, loved to pose for photographers while holding in hand a decree or law he had just signed, abstained from any publicity on Sunday when he affixed his initials on the plan to support the economy.
This plan of 900 billion dollars granting aid to households and small businesses had, however, rarely been voted by elected officials on both sides and was eagerly awaited across the country.
But the presidential signing was delayed, Donald Trump having castigated the text before finally giving in without getting anything.
The only images that will remain of his last presidential vacation are those, taken from afar, of him playing golf, white t-shirt and red Make America Great Again cap, screwed to his head.
A moins d'un mois de la fin de son mandat, nouvelle partie de golf pour Donald Trump https://t.co/5N7JDTqSLv pic.twitter.com/spXcECGqRV
— Paris Match (@ParisMatch) December 29, 2020
20 days
The White House had assured in its official program, which did not include any public events, that it would continue to work "relentlessly" for the Americans.
"His schedule will include many meetings and many phone calls," had taken care to specify, in an unusual phrase, the US executive.
As the United States, like many other countries, faces a dramatic rebound in the Covid-19 epidemic, however, it has not said a word about the pandemic and its health and economic impact. Except to denounce the attitude of the States, responsible in his eyes for the delays in the distribution of vaccines.
The gruesome records are piling up: on the penultimate day of his vacation in Florida, the United States on Wednesday recorded 3,927 deaths in 24 hours. Never seen.
After giving up at the last moment to spend New Years Eve at his club in Mar-a-Lago, Donald Trump was due in Washington on Thursday afternoon.
He has 20 days left in the White House.
"Stop this madness"
What will he do with it? Will he finally change his posture in the very last straight? Will he be present on Joe Biden's swearing-in day, January 20?
No one ventures into a prognosis. But the signs of support for this reclusive president are becoming a little rarer every day.
One of Washington’s most powerful men, Mitch McConnell, Republican Majority Leader in the Senate, acknowledged Joe Biden’s victory.
But he has also made it clear in recent days, in the household aid plan debate, that the White House tenant's demands are no longer one of his priorities.
Coup de grace: The New York Post, which backed him for four years and over which the president was full of praise, called on the president to finally digest his "anger at having lost."
