Will Trump accept defeat and leave the White House? Yes, experts say

 


President may try to use his power to push for more conservative court appointments or environmental deregulations.

Donald Trump may never concede that he legitimately lost the 2020 election and the US presidency.
That in itself will probably not matter too much, but he may use his final months in office before Joe Biden takes office in January, 2021 to push the divisive politics that have become his calling card. He may even boycott Biden’s inauguration ceremony.
But even if Trump and his colleagues sow a sloppy, chaotic and vindictive transition of power, it’s still unfathomable that the one-term president would belligerently barricade himself inside the Oval Office and refuse to leave, says Lawrence Douglas, a professor of law, jurisprudence and social thought at Amherst College.
“I do not see that happening,” says Douglas, whose book Will He Go? considers the aftermath of the 2020 election. “I think at some point, Donald Trump will submit to defeat.”
After flirting with the idea of rejecting unfavorable election results for years, Trump has stoked fears of worst-case scenarios: civil war, a weaponized supreme court, and even the end to American democracy. With only 10% of Trump’s supporters initially believing Biden won the presidential contest, many Americans are also concerned about an outburst of violence, even as the rancorous commander-in-chief paints a baseless picture of rigged, fraudulent results.
“I had such a big lead in all of these states late into election night, only to see the leads miraculously disappear as the days went by. Perhaps these leads will return as our legal proceedings move forward!” Trump tweeted on Friday.
In a last-ditch effort for Republicans to hold onto the executive branch, Trump and his allies have already begun filing a firestorm of lawsuits around the election. But they’ve made little headway thus far.
“If the number of contested ballots are not greater than the margin, courts are not eager to tear open an election,” although judicial scrutiny could actually address a “lingering cloud of illegitimacy” around the vote counts, said Jonathan Turley, a professor at George Washington University Law School.
If any of Trump’s legal challenges do find sympathy among Republican lawmakers and federal courts, that could cause a messy, fraught environment leading up to 20 January, when Biden is supposed to take office.
But it’s more probable that Republicans will remain silent even if Trump continues to fuss and largely refuses to cooperate with Biden’s people in the interim, says Julian Zelizer, a historian at Princeton University.
“The difficulty with that is it just doesn’t give the new administration the best tools, the best information, and the best transition that we would hope for,” Zelizer says. But “my guess is Biden’s already expecting that”.
Even as a lame duck, Trump could strategically force Democrats to oppose executive orders that underscore their party’s vulnerabilities ahead of runoff elections in Georgia that will determine who controls the US Senate, Turley says. If the outgoing administration does lean on executive orders, those can be dismantled by Biden.
But after Democrats spent four years challenging whether Trump could rescind former president Barack Obama’s policies, Turley says, they’ve created a “precedent of their own making” against reversing such orders without long administrative slogs.Trump may use the power of the presidency to push for more conservative court appointments, another tax cut or environmental deregulations – measures to “remind Republicans of why a lot of Republicans voted for him”, says Zelizer, even as he exits the White House. Although he lost re-election, he still won more than 70m votes, and he could wield significant authority over his base for years to come.“He will continue to tell tens of millions of Americans that the Biden presidency is illegitimate, that essentially the Democrats have committed a coup,” Douglas says. “That could certainly pave the way for a resurgence of Trumpism, if not Trump himself in 2024.”Meanwhile, Biden may inherit a divided government that’s struggled to cooperate and compromise in recent years, shaken by a tumultuous transition.
“He’s a decent person who genuinely will try to unite Americans,” Douglas says. “Now, whether he’ll be successful at doing that remains to be seen.”
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/nov/09/will-donald-trump-leave-office-and-accept-defeat-experts-explain

Trump Fires Mark Esper, Defense Secretary Who Opposed Use of Troops on U.S. Streets

 By Helene Cooper, Eric Schmitt and Maggie Haberman



Mr. Esper’s removal was quickly followed by speculation that the president was not finished: The F.B.I. director and the C.I.A. director could be next, according to administration officials.

President Trump fired Defense Secretary Mark T. Esper on Monday, upending the military’s leadership at a time when Mr. Trump’s refusal to concede the election has created a rocky and potentially precarious transition.
Mr. Trump announced the decision on Twitter, writing in an abrupt post that Mr. Esper had been “terminated.”
The president wrote that he was appointing Christopher C. Miller, whom he described as the “highly respected” director of the National Counterterrorism Center, to be the acting defense secretary. Mr. Miller will be the fourth official to lead the Pentagon under Mr. Trump.
Two White House officials said later on Monday that Mr. Trump was not finished, and that Christopher A. Wray, the F.B.I. director, and Gina Haspel, the C.I.A. director, could be next in line to be fired. Removing these senior officials — in effect decapitating the nation’s national security bureaucracy — would be without parallel by an outgoing president who has just lost re-election.
Democrats and national security veterans said it was a volatile move in the uncertain time between administrations, particularly by a president who has made clear that he does not want to give up power and that he would be reasserting his waning authority over the most powerful agencies of the government.
“President Trump’s decision to fire Secretary Esper out of spite is not just childish, it’s also reckless,” said Representative Adam Smith, Democrat of Washington and the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee. “It has long been clear that President Trump cares about loyalty above all else, often at the expense of competence, and during a period of presidential transition, competence in government is of the utmost importance.”
Two senior administration officials noted on Monday that Mr. Trump enjoyed firing people and had only two more months to do so. Mr. Esper’s dismissal also gave the president the chance to reclaim some of the postelection headlines, which have been dominated by President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s victory.
At the Pentagon, Mr. Esper’s departure means that Mr. Miller would — if he lasts — see out the end of the Trump administration. Defense Department officials have privately expressed worries that the president might initiate operations, whether overt or secret, against Iran or other adversaries during his last days in office.
“In my experience, there would only be a few reasons to fire a secretary of defense with 72 days left in an administration,” Representative Elissa Slotkin, Democrat of Michigan and a former Pentagon official in the Obama administration, said in a statement.
“One would be incompetence or wrongdoing, which do not seem to be the issue with Secretary Esper,” she said. “A second would be vindictiveness, which would be an irresponsible way to treat our national security. A third would be because the president wants to take actions that he believes his secretary of defense would refuse to take, which would be alarming. Whatever the reason, casting aside a secretary of defense during the volatile days of transition seems to neglect the president’s most important duty: to protect our national security.”
Mr. Esper’s downfall had been expected for months, after he took the rare step of disagreeing publicly with Mr. Trump in June and saying that active-duty military troops should not be sent to control the wave of protests in American cities.The defense secretary was aware that he was likely to be fired, but Pentagon officials said he hoped to continue serving as long as possible to try to sustain orderly leadership of the Defense Department. Although Mr. Esper had a resignation letter prepared, his allies said he did not think anything was imminent from Mr. Trump on Monday.But the president expressed his ire in the Oval Office on Monday morning, and the White House gave Mr. Esper only a few minutes’ advance notice of his firing.
In a two-page letter to Mr. Trump obtained by The New York Times, Mr. Esper said, “I serve the country in deference to the Constitution, so I accept your decision to replace me.”
Friends and colleagues of the new acting secretary praised Mr. Miller’s Army Special Forces background and counterterrorism credentials but expressed surprise that he had been elevated to such a senior position, even in a temporary capacity. Mr. Miller does not have the stature to push back on any precipitous actions that Mr. Trump might press in his final weeks in office, colleagues said.
“A move like this probably sends a chill through the senior ranks of the military,” Nicholas J. Rasmussen, a former top counterterrorism official in the Bush and Obama administrations, said in an email. “Not because of anything about Chris Miller personally, though it’s a highly unconventional choice, to be sure. But simply because a move like this contributes to a sense of instability and unstable decision-making at exactly the time when you want to avoid sending that kind of message around the world.”
Mr. Miller is a former Army Green Beret who participated in the liberation of Kandahar early in the war in Afghanistan. He also previously served as the top counterterrorism policy official in the National Security Council in the Trump White House. After that job, he briefly served in a top counterterrorism policy role at the Pentagon this year.
It was only in August that Mr. Miller was named to replace Russ Travers, who was the acting head of the counterterrorism center.
Upon his arrival at the Pentagon on Monday afternoon, Mr. Miller tripped on the stairs and said, “That would have been great, broke my ankle on the way in.”Mr. Miller began his military career as an enlisted infantryman in the Army Reserve in 1983. He also served as a military police officer in the District of Columbia National Guard. He was commissioned as a second lieutenant in 1987 and became an Army Green Beret in 1993.In addition to his deployment to Afghanistan, he also served in Iraq in 2003, both with the Fifth Special Forces Group.
Rosa Brooks, a Georgetown University law professor and a Defense Department official during the Obama administration, led a group of 100 current and former national security officials and election experts from both parties this year in exercises to simulate the most serious risks to a peaceful transition of power.
That exercise anticipated an 11th-hour switch of the defense secretary, particularly if Mr. Esper was perceived to suggest to the president that he should accept an election loss.
When Mr. Esper broke with Mr. Trump in June on deploying active-duty troops to U.S. cities, the secretary’s spokesman tried to walk back the damage, telling The Times that Mr. Trump did not want to use the Insurrection Act either, or he would have invoked it already. White House officials disagreed.
Mr. Esper, 55, a former secretary of the Army and a former Raytheon executive, became defense secretary in July 2019, after Mr. Trump withdrew the nomination of Patrick M. Shanahan, the acting defense secretary, amid an F.B.I. inquiry into allegations from Mr. Shanahan’s former wife that he had punched her in the stomach. Mr. Shanahan denied the accusations.
Mr. Shanahan had been standing in for Jim Mattis, who resigned as defense secretary in 2018, citing his own differences with the president.
Mr. Esper had taken pains to hew to the Trump line during his tenure. But concern over invoking the Insurrection Act to send troops to quell civil unrest across the country was deep in the Pentagon. Under heavy public criticism, Mr. Esper ultimately broke with the president.
Mr. Trump has referred to Mr. Esper as “Mr. Yesper.” Ironically, it was the defense secretary’s public break with the president during a news conference in June that infuriated Mr. Trump to begin with. Those comments came after Mr. Esper had accompanied Mr. Trump on his walk across Lafayette Square outside the White House, where protesters had been tear-gassed, prompting condemnation from former military and civilian Defense Department officials.
By midsummer, Mr. Esper was walking a fine line to push back on Mr. Trump’s other contentious positions involving the military.The Pentagon, without once mentioning the word “Confederate,” announced in July that it would essentially ban displays of the Confederate flag on military installations around the world.
After the events in June, Mr. Esper avoided the news media and kept a low profile to prevent being pulled into election politics.
He traveled often beginning in early summer, including overseas trips to North Africa, the Middle East and India. When he did speak in public, either abroad or in Washington, it was often in prerecorded remarks on safe subjects (criticizing China and Russia on the Africa trip) or in friendly places (a session on military readiness at The Heritage Foundation, where Mr. Esper had served as the organization’s chief of staff).
Mark Meadows, the White House chief of staff, called Mr. Esper five minutes before the president’s Twitter post to tell him he had been fired. Mr. Esper was still at the Pentagon cleaning out his desk on Monday afternoon when Mr. Miller arrived, administration officials said. It was unclear if the two men spoke; Mr. Miller met with Gen. Mark A. Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Yet on the single biggest issue of 2020 — the coronavirus pandemic — history may show that Mr. Esper has, by far, outperformed his boss, who largely refused to wear a mask and contracted the coronavirus during an outbreak at the White House. Mr. Esper, by contrast, has strictly adhered to guidelines from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on wearing a mask when unable to keep a recommended social distance.
At a Pentagon virtual town-hall-style meeting, the defense secretary responded to a sailor on the aircraft carrier Gerald R. Ford who said that the required social distancing aboard the ship was hurting morale.
“It is tedious — I understand that,” Mr. Esper said. “But I think it’s showing, in terms of the Navy’s results in terms of infection rates, that they’re doing a very good job.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/09/us/politics/esper-defense-secretary.html?action=click&module=Spotlight&pgtype=Homepage

بلاول بھٹو زرداری - گلگت بلتستان میں حکومت بنانے کے بعد گلگت بلتستان کے مسائل اولین ترجیحات کی بنیاد پر حل کیے جائینگے۔

چیئرمین پیپلز پارٹی بلاول بھٹو زرداری نے ہنزہ میں پارٹی کے سینئر ترین کارکن لعل حسین کے طرف سے ناشتے کی دی گئی دعوت میں شرکت کی۔ دعوت میں سینٹر مصطفی نواز کھوکھر، جمیل احمد سومرو،سینیٹر شیری رحمن، فیصل کریم کنڈی ،نجم الدین خان ہدایت اللہ خان، جاوید نایاب لغاری،مسرور احمد راجپر سمیت دیگر پیپلزپارٹی کے رہنما بھی موجود تھے۔ چیئرمین پیپلز پارٹی بلاول بھٹو زرداری سے شمشال ماو ¿نٹین کوہ پیماون نے اپنے مسائل سے آگاہ کیا، چیئرمین بلاول بھٹو زرداری نے انہیں یقین دلایا کے گلگت بلتستان میں حکومت بنانے کے بعد ان کے مسائل ترجیح بنیادوں پر حل کئی جائینگے۔ چیئرمین پیپلز پارٹی بلاول بھٹو زرداری نے نگر کے علاقے ہوپر ویلی میں پارٹی کارکنوں کے اجلاس سے خطاب کرتے ہوئے پارٹی کے عہدیداروں اور کارکنوں کو ہدایت کی ہے کہ وہ ہر گھر کا دروازہ کھٹکھٹاکر ووٹروں کو پیغام دیں گے۔ انہوں نے کہا کہ پیپلزپارٹی شہیدوں کی پارٹی ہے جس میں گلگت بلتستان کے عوام کو ہمیشہ دیا ہے کبھی چھینا کچھ نہیں دوسرے طرف ظالم ہیں جو آپ کے حقوق چھیننا چاہتے ہیں گلگت بلتستان میں پی ٹی آئی اور مذہبی جماعتوں کے درمیان غیر فطری اتحاد پر شاعرانہ انداز میں تنقید کرتے ہوئے کہا کے عجیب تیری سیاست ہے عجیب کے تیرا نظام یزید سے بھی شناسائی حسین کو بھی سلام۔ 

چیئرمین پیپلز پارٹی بلاول بھٹو زرداری نے کہا کے ابھی جی بی میں حکومت بنائی ہی نہیں عمران خان کہے رہے ہیں کہ وہ جی بی کے عوام سے سبسڈی واپس لینگے اور ٹیکس لگائیں گے۔ ورکز کنوینشن میں موجود کارکنوں سے جب چیئرمین پی پی پی نے سوال کیا کے سلیکٹڈ عوام کو دیا ہی کیا ہے؟ تو کارکنوں نے پرجوش نعروں میں جواب دیا کے کچھ نہیں دیا ہے صرف ظلم کیا ہے۔ چیئرمین پیپلز پارٹی نے کارکنوں کی جدوجہد اور کارکردگی کو سراہتے ہوئے کہا کے میں آپ کی کارکردگی اور قردار سے مطمئن ہوں مجھے خوشی ہے کے میں آپ کے درمیان موجود ہوں آپ کی جدوجہد ابھی ختم نہیں ہوئی 15 نومبر تک آپ اپنے گھروں میں نا بیٹھیں اور محنت کریں تاکہ 15 نومبر کے انتخابات میں ہم بھرپور کامیابی حاصل کریں۔ بلاول بھٹو زرداری نے کہا کے مجھے آپ کے ساتھ کی ضرورت ہے ہمارا تعلق تین نسلوں سے ہے۔ انہوں نے کہا کے میں گلگت بلتستان کی جگہ جگہ گیا ہوں مگر مجھ ایسی کوئی جگہ نہیں ملی جہاں شہید ذوالفقارعلی بھٹو نہیں گئے ہوں ادھر نگر خاص میں ایک بڑی اجتماع سے خطاب کرتے ہوئے چیئرمین پیپلز پارٹی نے کہاکہ میرا خپلو سے لیکر سکردو تک عوام کی طرف سے شاندار استقبال دیکھ کر سلیکٹڈ کٹھ پتلی کو گلگت بلتستان کا خیال آیا تو انہوں نے ایک گندا وزیر بھیجا ہے جو یہاں پر آکر گندی زبان بول رہا ہے مریم نواز آپ کی مہمان ہے ان کے خلاف بھی گندی زبان استعمال کر رہا ہے، کیا یہ آپ کی ثقافت ہے؟ کیا آپ اس زبان کو پسند کرتے ہیں جس پر حاضرین نے نفی میں جواب دیا اور عمران خان کے خلاف شدید نعرے بازی کی جلسہ عام کے دوران عوام شہید ذوالفقارعلی بھٹو اور محترمہ بینظیر بھٹو شہید اور سابق صدر آصف علی زرداری کے حق میں پر جوش نعرے بازی کرتے رہے۔ 

چیئرمین پیپلز پارٹی بلاول بھٹو زرداری نے مزید کہا کے انہوں نے ان کے حقوق کے لیے تحریک شروع کر رکھی ہے جو گلگت بلتستان کے عوام کی حق حاکمیت ،حق ملکیت اور حق روزگار کے لئے ہے۔ انہوں نے کہا کے اب تو نیشنل سیکیورٹی اور ہمارے مخالف بھی گلگت بلتستان کے حوالے سے ہمارے پیج پر آگئے ہیں جو آپ کی بہت بڑی فتح ہے مگر ہم 70 سال کی بات کرتے ہیں ان 70 سال کے دوران آپ کا جو استحصال ہوا آپ کے جو حقوق غصب ہوتے رہے ان کے ازالے کی بات کر رہا ہوں اور ریاست نے اس کا ازالہ کرنا ہے۔ چیئرمین پیپلز پارٹی نے کہا کے میں چاہتا ہوں کے وزیراعظم گلگت بلتستان کے منتخب نمائندوں کے ووٹ سے منتخب ہوں اور ریاستی امور کے فیصلوں میں بھی آپ کی شراکت ہو۔ انہوں نے کہا کے بلاول بھٹو زرداری جو وعدہ کرتا ہے وہ پورا کرتا ہے ہمارا تین نسلوں کا آپ کے ساتھ رشتہ اور ساتھ ہے اور یہ ساتھ میں نبھاﺅں گا۔ چیئرمین پیپلز پارٹی نے مزید کہا کے عمران خان کو ہر وعدہ جھوٹا ہے انہوں نے ایک کروڑ نوکریاں دینے کا وعدہ کیا تھا مگر اسٹیل ملز اور پی ٹی ڈی سی سے ہزاروں ملازمین کو برطرف کیا 50 لاکھ گھر بنانے کا وعدہ کیا تھا مگر لاکھوں لوگوں سے گھروں کی چھت چھین لی، سلیکٹڈ گلگت بلتستان میں بھی تباہی کرنا چاہتا ہے۔ انہوں نے کہا کے عمران نیازی تو خود عبوری وزیراعظم ہیں اور جو عبوری وزیراعظم ہوں وہ کیسے صوبہ بنا سکتا ہے ؟ انہوں کہا کے جب آصف علی زرداری نے گلگت بلتستان کو صوبہ کا درجہ دیا تو عمران نے سپریم کورٹ میں اس کے خلاف پٹیشن دائر کی جو ابھی تک واپس نہیں لی۔ 

چیئرمین پیپلز پارٹی نے کہا کے ہم قانون سازی کر کے گلگت بلتستان سے منتخب نمائندوں کو قومی اسمبلی اور سینیٹ میں بیٹھائیں گے تب تک ہم اسلام آباد سے پوچھتے رہیں گے کہ گلگت بلتستان کے عوام کو حقوق کیوں نہیں ملےَ چیئرمین پیپلز پارٹی نے کہا کے گلگت بلتستان کے عوام کو جو سبسڈی شہید ذوالفقارعلی بھٹو نے دے تھی اس کو کوئی ختم نہیں کر سکتا۔ عوامی اجتماع سے سینیٹر شیری رحمان، سینیٹر مصطفی نواز کھوکھر نگر حلقہ 5 سے پیپلز پارٹی کے امیدوار مرزا حسین اور پارٹی رہنما محمد علی اختر نے بھی خطاب کیا۔ چیئرمین پیپلز پارٹی بلاول بھٹو زرداری نے پیر کی شام سمائیر میں اس مقام پر خطاب کیا جس مقام پر شہید ذوالفقارعلی بھٹو نے راجگیری نظام اور ایف سی آر کے خاتمہ کا اعلان کیا تھا۔ چیئرمین بھٹو جب سمائیر پہنچے تو ہزاروں کی تعداد میں عوام نے ان کا والہانہ استقبال کیا ۔عوامی اجتماع سے خطاب کرتے ہوئے بلاول بھٹو زرداری نے کہا کے شہید ذوالفقارعلی بھٹو نے آپ سے جو وعدہ کیا وہ پورا کیا شہید محترمہ بینظیر بھٹو نے جو وعدے کئے وہ پورے کرتی رہی اورپھر گلگت بلتستان کو صوبہ بنانے کو وعدہ بھی صدر آصف علی زرداری نے پورا کیا ۔میں جو آپ سے وعدہ کر رہا ہوں کے آپ کو حق حاکمیت دلاﺅں گا دریا اور پہاڑوں پر آپ کے حق ملکیت کو تسلیم کراﺅں گا اور حق روزگار بھی دلاﺅں گا۔ یہاں پر بھی انہوں نے عمران خان کو کڑی تنقید کا نشانہ بناتے ہوئے کہا کہ گندی سلیکٹڈ وزیراعظم نے یہاں گندے وزیر بھیجے ہیں جو گندی زباں استعمال کر تے ہیں۔ 15 نومبر کو پیپلزپارٹی کو شہید بینظیر بھٹو کو ووٹ دیکر اس گندے وزیر کو یہاں سے بھگاﺅ اور اس کے بعد ہم اسلام آباد جاکر اس گندے وزیر اعظم کو گھر بھیجے دیں گے-

 فکر جاتے ہوئے شایار کے مقام پر سیکڑوں کی تعداد میں جیالوں نے استقبال کیا اور پھول نچھاور کئے ۔ اس کے بعدبلاول بھٹو زرداری نے پارٹی کے سرگرم کارکن شہید ذوالفقارعلی بھٹو کے ساتھی سلطان علی کی قبر پر پھول چڑھائے اور فاتحہ خوانی کی اور پارٹی پرچم لہرایا۔


https://www.ppp.org.pk/pr/24058/