Trump relents as administration begins Biden transition

More than two weeks after clinching electoral victory, President-elect Joe Biden can finally start his formal transition to the White House.

The General Services Administration on Monday finally acknowledged Biden as the apparent winner of the 2020 presidential election, allowing his team to get working on the logistics of the transition. President Donald Trump acknowledged the move in a tweet, attempting to take credit for the decision, but stressed that it did not amount to a concession. By law, the president-elect cannot access federal transition funds or contact federal agencies to plan staffing until the GSA recognizes an electoral winner.

“I want to thank Emily Murphy at GSA for her steadfast dedication and loyalty to our Country,” Trump tweeted, referring to the head of the GSA. “She has been harassed, threatened, and abused — and I do not want to see this happen to her, her family, or employees of GSA. Our case STRONGLY continues, we will keep up the good ... fight, and I believe we will prevail!”

He continued: “Nevertheless, in the best interest of our Country, I am recommending that Emily and her team do what needs to be done with regard to initial protocols, and have told my team to do the same.”

The shift in posture capped a three-week period that has seen a defiant president refuse to acknowledge the encroaching reality of a Biden victory. Since election night, Trump has proclaimed rampant fraud stripped him of victory (but presented no credible evidence), backed scores of lawsuits to disqualify votes (but made no progress) and personally lobbied state lawmakers to overturn Biden's win (but found no takers).

By Monday, even senior White House officials said the president’s statement was becoming inevitable, as key states like Georgia and Michigan started to certify Biden's victory. Still, those same officials were unaware Trump had cleared the way for the presidential transition to begin until they saw his Monday night tweet, which was drafted with input from the White House Counsel’s Office, according to one official familiar with the discussions.

Trump had spent much of the weekend contemplating what he should do as his options to contest the election dwindled. He solicited advice from top confidants and campaign aides. He criticized his legal team’s lackluster performance. One person familiar with those discussions said “everyone but Rudy [Giuliani]” encouraged the president to greenlight the transition process, while continuing to pursue legal options to challenge the election.

People close to Trump told him that he did not have to concede, but that he should at least allow the transition to kick in, according to a Republican close to the White House. The president’s allies were concerned about protecting his legacy while also hoping to avoid Biden using a botched transition as a major talking point, the person said.

On Monday, Trump acceded to the advice, albeit in his own Trumpian way.

“You’ll have stuff like this that’s very close, but you’ll never be an outright confirmation of the results or acknowledgment of a loss,” said one adviser to the Trump campaign.

Similarly, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer tweeted that Monday‘s news was “probably the closest thing to a concession President Trump could issue.“

Later in the evening, Trump further hammered the point that he had no intention of stopping his legal fights.

"What does GSA being allowed to preliminarily work with the Dems have to do with continuing to pursue our various cases on what will go down as the most corrupt election in American political history? We are moving full speed ahead. Will never concede to fake ballots & “Dominion”," he tweeted, referring to the vote software company that right-wing conspiracy theorists claim switched votes (there is no evidence to support this and Dominion dismisses the claims).

Until Monday, GSA had stayed silent on the outcome of the election, breaking with past precedent of administration's swiftly authorizing government resources for an incoming administration. The silence continued even as vote counted crawled to an end and every major news outlet and numerous foreign dignitaries began recognizing Biden as the winner

With the GSA‘s acknowledgment, Biden‘s team now has access to over $7 million in public funds.

“Today’s decision is a needed step to begin tackling the challenges facing our nation, including getting the pandemic under control and our economy back on track,” Yohannes Abraham, transition executive director for Biden, said in a statement on Monday.

Abraham added that the team would use the coming days to “discuss the pandemic response, have a full accounting of our national security interests, and gain complete understanding of the Trump administration’s efforts to hollow out government agencies.”

In a letter to the Biden team, Murphy insisted that her delay in recognizing his electoral win was not because of personal or political pressures. Murphy said she had received threats against her and her loved ones if she did not start the transition, but held off based on precedent relating to incomplete counts and legal challenges to election results.

“I have dedicated much of my adult life to public service, and I have always strived to do what is right,” Murphy wrote. “Please know that I came to my decision independently, based on the law and available facts.”

CNN first reported Murphy‘s notice to Biden.

Murphy repeated her message to GSA employees in an email on Monday evening, using much of the same language.

“I want you to hear directly from me: I was never pressured with regard to the substance or timing of my decision,“ she wrote in her email to staffers, obtained by POLITICO. “The decision was solely mine. I was not directly or indirectly pressured by any Executive Branch official — including those who work at the White House or GSA — to delay this determination or to speed it up.“

Though Murphy said she was not under private pressure to make a decision, prominent Republicans had begin publicly pushing Trump to let the transition get underway.

On Monday alone, Republican Sens. Lamar Alexander, Shelley Moore Capito and Rob Portman all publicly urged Trump to approve the transition. Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) made a similar call on Saturday.

Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) last week called White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and told him he had questions about the GSA’s delay, according to a person familiar with the call. Meadows assured him the issues would be addressed properly and in due time.

Even Fox News‘ Tucker Carlson, who frequently trumpets Trump‘s various allegations of malfeasance, took to his show to question the validity of former Trump lawyer Sidney Powell in her lengthy conspiracy theories of mass election fraud. (The Trump legal team abruptly cut ties with Powell on Sunday night.) Conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh similarly pressed the Trump camp on his show to produce evidence of mass improprieties.

“When you’ve lost Rush Limbaugh and Tucker … ” mused a top GOP official on Monday.

Powell‘s performance at a news conference last week angered Trump, according to the Republican close to the White House. She failed to present credible evidence to support her claims of mass fraud and became combative with reporters when asked for proof.

It was a major inflection point for Trump, the Republican said, and it became clear there was little weight to back such amplified claims.

Still, Trump and many of his Republican allies have continued to contest the election as rife with fraud, pushing legal action and investigations that they say could flip the Electoral College in the president's favor. Yet with no evidence of widespread malfeasance, a chain of legal challenges having fizzled and margins in the tens of thousands in key swing states, the odds of such a flip are next to nil.

And there are a few hopefuls who are at least publicly holding out hope the election could turn in Trump‘s favor. One person close to the Trump campaign said after Monday‘s announcement: “It‘s probably just a realization that there needs to be some sort of transition in case things don’t turn out his way.“

The withholding of GSA-authorized funds isn't the only way Trump has stiff-armed Biden's team.

Trump has refused to share the President’s Daily Brief with Biden, despite calls from some Senate Republicans to do so. The Office of Management and Budget has also pushed forward with Trump’s budget for 2022, acting as though Trump will have a second term.

The roadblocks were further aberrations from the collegiality usually shown during a presidential transition. But they were telegraphed before the election by Trump, who openly refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power and warned Democrats would try to steal the election.

Since Biden was declared the election's winner, members of Trump’s administration, including Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, have also made waves by refusing to acknowledge Biden as the next president or otherwise casting doubt on the election's legitimacy.

The unprecedented delay in the transition has sparked calls for new safeguards to prevent a similar situation in the future. Max Stier, president and CEO of the Partnership for Public Service, lamented on Monday that Biden's team has lost time in addressing some of the nation's more pressing issues. Biden’s transition team has already voiced concerns that the tardy transition could have serious consequences in dealing with the coronavirus pandemic.

“Moving forward, we must pursue statutory remedies to ensure that a transition is never again upheld for arbitrary or political purposes,” Stier said in a statement. “A clearer standard and a low bar for triggering access to transition resources are crucial to protecting the apolitical nature of presidential transitions.”

Regardless, Biden’s team didn’t waste time waiting for the official acknowledgment to make preparations for the White House. His transition team met with former civil servants and other outside experts to better understand the agencies they’d be staffing, and he has been winnowing down candidates for various appointments.

Biden named his chief of staff, Ron Klain, only a couple of days after being announced the winner. He also has gone ahead with naming key Cabinet positions, including his secretaries of State and Treasury, over the past few days.

Daniel Lippman contributed to this report.