Longtime political rivals, United States President Joe Biden and President-elect Donald Trump, on Wednesday, November 13, 2024, met at the White House for the first time since Trump won the presidential election and both promised a smooth transfer of power in January 2025.
The two American leaders sat side by side before a roaring fire in the Oval Office, a peaceful scene that belied tensions between them.
The meeting ended after roughly two hours, a White House official said.
Biden, a Democrat, defeated Trump in the 2020 election but dropped out of the 2024 race in July after a disastrous debate with the Republican Trump.
Vice President Kamala Harris later became the presidential candidate but lost to Trump.
Biden said: “We’re looking forward to having like we said, a smooth transition, do everything we can to make sure you’re accommodated, what you need.
“Welcome, welcome back.”
Trump, who takes over on January 20, 2025, said: “Politics is tough, and it’s many cases not a very nice world, but it is a nice world today, and I appreciate very much a transition that’s so smooth it’ll be as smooth as it can get, and I very much appreciate that, Joe.”
Reporters shouted questions but were quickly ushered out.
The traditional courtesy of welcoming the president-elect into the Oval Office at the White House is one that Trump did not extend when Biden won in 2020.
It was a sharp contrast to the criticism the two men have hurled at each other for years. Their respective teams hold vastly different positions on policies from climate change to Russia to trade.
First lady Jill Biden joined Biden in greeting Trump on his arrival, Reuters reported.
The White House said she gave Trump a handwritten letter of congratulations for his wife, Melania Trump, and “expressed her team’s readiness to assist with the transition”.
Biden, 81, has portrayed Trump as a threat to democracy, while Trump, 78, has portrayed Biden as incompetent.
Trump made false claims of widespread fraud after losing the 2020 election to Biden.
