In spite of relentless voter suppression forced into place by Republicans, including the deliberate sabotage of the U.S. Postal Service, (by the soon-to-be-unemployed Postmaster General Louis DeJoy), President-elect Biden and Vice President-elect Harris will have received about five million more votes than Donald Trump when the counting is over.
Secretary Clinton received about three million more votes than Trump in 2016, so the “Trump majority” talked about by his supporters was always fiction. Trump and the people around him will try to convince themselves that Trump actually won the election, but all of that noise and the specious lawsuits will amount to nothing.
Trump is a loser, but he is very unlikely to ever admit that or even concede the election. His life’s work is lying, and there’s no indication that he will ever change his behavior.
The unfortunate reality for Trump is that his business has been failing since he took office, so there’s a hot mess for him to go back to on Jan. 20. His golf courses are losing money now at a fantastic rate, and his hotels are operating at a loss. His commercial office buildings are suffering from rent loss due to the raging pandemic. How’s that for karma?
Since starting his first campaign for president, more buildings have had the Trump name chiseled off than have added it on. That’s happening as a debt payment of more than $350 million is coming due to Deutsche Bank (no U.S. bank would lend him money) on loans that Trump personally guaranteed.
Trump wrote off the business of more than half of the United States with his mean spirit, indifference to the damage he was causing, malicious ignorance and incompetence. While Trump was in office, there was some glimmer of hope for his business because Trump’s remarkable corruption encouraged governments and individuals to patronize his properties in exchange for access to the president. That will end abruptly on Jan. 20.
Also on Jan. 20, Trump loses protection from the taxpayer-funded, Justice-Department effort to shield Trump from multiple personal lawsuits. Jan. 20 also brings the loss of immunity from prosecution for crimes against the various states for tax and other financial crimes. A federal pardon will not shield him from state prosecutions.
Speaking of Trump’s incompetence, another 1,200 Americans will die today from COVID-19, so, naturally, Trump is golfing. The wreckage of death and economic collapse he created means nothing to Trump.
When asked about President-elect Biden’s win, Trump insisted that Biden didn’t win. When the Biden campaign was asked about when would happen if Trump didn’t leave the White House on Jan. 20, the campaign spokesperson explained that the federal government is certainly capable of dealing with trespassers in government buildings — a great response.
Following his inauguration, Biden will be busy reversing many of the more-idiotic executive orders signed by Trump — a long list — and putting protections for water and air back in place. It’ll take some time to clean up Trump’s trash. President Biden will also have to work at fumigating the Justice Department and other agencies corrupted by Trump, and will work to reunite parents with the 545 children at the southern border that Trump made orphans.
Jared Kushner will be returning to his family business, where he spent the years before government service driving the company nearly into bankruptcy through his incompetent deal-making.
Most of Trump’s political appointees (with the exception of dedicated public servants like Christopher Wray) should all expect to have their desks cleaned out by the afternoon of Jan. 20. Good riddance to them. And good riddance to Donald Trump, the worst president ever.
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Kurt Last is a resident of Anahola.
