• Home
  • Independent Voter News
  • Quizzes
  • Election Dissection
  • Sections
  • Events
  • Directory
  • About Us
  • Glossary
  • Opinion
  • Campaign Finance
  • Redistricting
  • Civic Ed
  • Voting
  • Fact Check
  • News
  • Analysis
  • Subscriptions
  • Log in
Leveraging Our Differences
  • news & opinion
    • Big Picture
      • Civic Ed
      • Ethics
      • Leadership
      • Leveraging big ideas
      • Media
    • Business & Democracy
      • Corporate Responsibility
      • Impact Investment
      • Innovation & Incubation
      • Small Businesses
      • Stakeholder Capitalism
    • Elections
      • Campaign Finance
      • Independent Voter News
      • Redistricting
      • Voting
    • Government
      • Balance of Power
      • Budgeting
      • Congress
      • Judicial
      • Local
      • State
      • White House
    • Justice
      • Accountability
      • Anti-corruption
      • Budget equity
    • Columns
      • Beyond Right and Left
      • Civic Soul
      • Congress at a Crossroads
      • Cross-Partisan Visions
      • Democracy Pie
      • Our Freedom
  • Pop Culture
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
  • events
  • About
      • Mission
      • Advisory Board
      • Staff
      • Contact Us
Sign Up
  1. Home>
  2. Government Ethics>
  3. transition>

One top Trump appointee's silence means the Biden transition cannot begin

David Hawkings
November 09, 2020
GSA Administrator Emily Murphy

GSA Administrator Emily Murphy has not signed the paperwork necessary to begin the formal transition process.

Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call/Getty Images

The peaceful transfer of power, the final bedrock of American democracy that Donald Trump has the capacity to crack while he's still president, is now officially off to a delayed start.

Two days after Joe Biden claimed the presidency with a clear majority of electoral votes, the Trump administration has not followed through on the formalities that begin the transition. Each of the 72 days before the inauguration when that does not happen represents time unavailable for responsible, if not good, governance to prevail during a resurgent pandemic.

Instead, the president's lawyers signaled they were pressing ahead with lawsuits in a handful of states, none for now supported by credible evidence of significant election irregularities — let alone the fraud that Trump claims.


The General Services Administration, the agency that manages the bulk of government logistics, must formally recognize Biden has become the president-elect. Only then may his team start spending $10 million in transition funding, conduct background checks for ultimately 4,000 political appointments, and receive access to government officials and records meant to create a seamless handoff of executive authority.

As of Monday the GSA administrator, Trump appointee Emily Murphy, has not signed the necessary paperwork, known formally as an "ascertainment," or given guidance when she will. The law explaining how her agency should "ascertain the apparent successful candidate" appears murky, however, making a delay justifiable at least in the short term.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

At the same time, the president has not conceded that he's lost to Biden and says he will soon appear to "discuss the Mail-In Ballot Hoax!"

The advisory board of the nonpartisan Center for Presidential Transition, made up of prominent members of both parties, prodded the Trump administration Sunday night.

"While there will be legal disputes requiring adjudication, the outcome is sufficiently clear that the transition process must now begin," said the panel, which includes former George W. Bush White House chief of staff Josh Bolten and Mack McLarty, who had the job for Bill Clinton. "We urge the Trump administration to immediately begin the post-election transition process."

There is no precedent in the modern era of a president erecting such hurdles for his successor. But Biden pressed ahead with the power available to him, naming a 10-person panel of coronavirus advisors and assembling teams of aides to work on budgeting, personnel and policy transitions at each department and major agency.

A month ago he announced an ethics plan for a potential transition, with rules designed to make it harder for lobbyists to work on the effort. The guidelines are similar to what Barack Obama set for his transition 12 years ago, generally barring formally registered lobbyists from working on the transition in parts of the government that regulate their clients' businesses.

This summer, the Trump administration also formally promised to provide a Biden transition team with office space, telephone and internet service, travel for the president-elect and national security briefings.

The GSA did not allow the 2000 presidential transition to begin until after the Floridia recount dispute was settled by the Supreme Court, just five weeks before the inauguration. The shortened process was later identified by the 9/11 Commission as contributing to the nation's lack of preparation for the attacks.

Some aspects of the transition can happen without GSA's signoff. Airspace above Biden's Delaware home has been restricted and Secret Service protection for Biden, Vice President-elect Kamala Harris and their families has been ramped up and turned over to the agency's presidential protective detail.

Meanwhile, Trump is pushing for recounts or to disallow batches of votes in a handful of closely contested states — with a focus of the effort in Pennsylvania, the state that all the major news organizations predicted on Saturday that Biden would win, its 20 electoral votes assuring his election. By Monday afternoon the president-elect's margin was almost 46,000 votes in the state, with just 2 percent of ballots to be tabulated.

Top election officials there and in three other battlegrounds with narrow margins — Arizona, Georgia and Nevada — say they have seen no widespread irregularities or fraud. News stories are increasingly quoting Trump attorneys as describing their legal efforts as more about helping their client confront the inevitable than about changing the outcome.

But most senior congressional Republicans, including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, have stayed quiet about the election result.

From Your Site Articles
  • Some Republicans pick democracy over Trump - The Fulcrum ›
  • What if Trump won't concede? - The Fulcrum ›
  • No matter who wins, millions won't accept the results - The Fulcrum ›
  • Everyone has a role to place in civil society - The Fulcrum ›
  • Trump's stonewalling on transition leads to suspicions - The Fulcrum ›
  • Former security officials say transition delay poses risk - The Fulcrum ›
  • Officials hail election security success, undercutting Trump - The Fulcrum ›
  • Experts invoke 9/11 in urging Trump to start transition - The Fulcrum ›
  • History is full of difficult presidential transitions - The Fulcrum ›
  • McConnell finally accepts Biden's victory - The Fulcrum ›
  • Report: How to reform the Senate confirmation process - The Fulcrum ›
Related Articles Around the Web
  • Mike Pence evaded a question about peaceful transfer of power ›
  • AP Explains: Transfer of power under 25th Amendment ›
  • Trump's bid to discredit election raises fear that he will undermine a ... ›
  • Kudlow: 'There will be a peaceful transfer of power' if Biden wins ... ›
  • US business leaders call for peaceful transfer of power | Financial ... ›
transition

Want to write
for The Fulcrum?

If you have something to say about ways to protect or repair our American democracy, we want to hear from you.

Submit
Get some Leverage Sign up for The Fulcrum Newsletter
Follow
Contributors

How a college freshman led the effort to honor titans of democracy reform

Jeremy Garson

Our poisonous age of absolutism

Jay Paterno

Re-imagining Title IX: An opportunity to flex our civic muscles

Lisa Kay Solomon

'Independent state legislature theory' is unconstitutional

Daniel O. Jamison

How afraid are we?

Debilyn Molineaux

Politicians certifying election results is risky and unnecessary

Kevin Johnson
latest News

How the anti-abortion movement shaped campaign finance law and paved the way for Trump

Amanda Becker, The 19th
24 June

Podcast: Journalist and political junkie Ken Rudin

Our Staff
24 June

A study in contrasts: Low-turnout runoffs vs. Alaska’s top-four, all-mail primary

David Meyers
23 June

Video: Team Democracy Urges Citizens to Sign SAFE Pledge

Our Staff
23 June

Podcast: Past, present, future

Our Staff
23 June

Video: America's vulnerable elections

Our Staff
22 June
Videos

Video: Memorial Day 2022

Our Staff

Video: Helping loved ones divided by politics

Our Staff

Video: What happened in Virginia?

Our Staff

Video: Infrastructure past, present, and future

Our Staff

Video: Beyond the headlines SCOTUS 2021 - 2022

Our Staff

Video: Should we even have a debt limit

Our Staff
Podcasts

Podcast: Did economists move the Democrats to the right?

Our Staff
02 May

Podcast: The future of depolarization

Our Staff
11 February

Podcast: Sore losers are bad for democracy

Our Staff
20 January

Deconstructed Podcast from IVN

Our Staff
08 November 2021
Recommended
Bridge Alliance intern Sachi Bajaj speaks at the June 12 Civvy Awards.

How a college freshman led the effort to honor titans of democracy reform

Leadership
abortion law historian Mary Ziegler

How the anti-abortion movement shaped campaign finance law and paved the way for Trump

Campaign Finance
Podcast: Journalist and political junkie Ken Rudin

Podcast: Journalist and political junkie Ken Rudin

Media
Abortion rights and anti-abortion protestors at the Supreme Court

Our poisonous age of absolutism

Big Picture
Virginia primary voter

A study in contrasts: Low-turnout runoffs vs. Alaska’s top-four, all-mail primary

Video: Team Democracy Urges Citizens to Sign SAFE Pledge

Video: Team Democracy Urges Citizens to Sign SAFE Pledge

Voting