Rethinking Presidential Transitions: Trump Declines Federal Agreement, Opts for Independence

by Jeff Chiiders

The most encouraging headline of the day appeared in the most unexpected place, the Washington Post. Behold this tantalizing possibility:

 
Do it! Dismantle the whole thing! Get rid of all the dirty-tricks departments and color revolution cadres. Let’s just keep the handful of real diplomats they keep chained deep in a State Department dungeon someplace.

But there’s a bigger and even more encouraging story lurking just below the apparent story’s surface: Trump’s transition team. How would you like another wildly encouraging headline? Here’s one, from yesterday’s New York Times:

 
It’s already working! Kennedy is immunizing the whole team against pharma propaganda.

RFK JR: I asked God for 19 years to put me in a position to end the chronic disease epidemic. And in August, he sent me Donald Trump. pic.twitter.com/QcDRGAoGms

— The Post Millennial (@TPostMillennial) November 1, 2024

But the best Transition Team story of all appeared in the Washington Post yesterday under the headline, “Congress tried to fix presidential transitions. Trump is testing the changes.”  According to the article, Trump has refused to sign a standard government agreement that would give him access to funding, offices, and security access to build out his transition team.

Signing that agreement comes with strings. Strings like fundraising limits and a strict deadline for when the transition team can first start working. So Trump went off the map. He raised his own money to pay his transition team, build out their offices (in New York, not DC), hire support staff, and get them all working months before the date the agreement would have permitted.

According to the article, Trump doesn’t trust the normal transition process. Imagine that. Which is why he’s not signed the agreement, doesn’t have to follow the rules, and has set his team up in offices outside DC. The point being, they’re already working hard to hit the ground running and far away from lobbyists and the deep state.

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