WASHINGTON (AP) – It’s a club Donald Trump was never really interested in joining and certainly not so soon: the cadre of former commanders-in-chief who respect the presidency enough to put aside often bitter political disagreements and even cooperate for a common purpose.
Members of the ex-presidents club pose for photos together. They smile and pat each other on the back as they walk around historical events, or sit gloomily side by side at VIP funerals. Together they tackle special projects. They rarely criticize each other and tend to use even less harsh words about their White House successors.
However, like so many other presidential traditions, this seems like one Trump is likely to ignore. Now that he’s left office, it’s hard to see him embrace the stately, exclusive club of living former presidents.
“He kind of laughed at the idea of being accepted into the presidential club,” said Kate Andersen Brower, who interviewed Trump in 2019 for her book “Team of Five: The Presidents’ Club in the Age of Trump.” “He was like, ‘I don’t think I’ll be accepted.'”
It’s equally clear that the other members of the club don’t want him that bad, at least for now.
Former Presidents Barack Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton recorded a three-minute video of Arlington National Cemetery following President Joe Biden’s inauguration this week, praising peaceful presidential succession as a core of American democracy. The segment did not include a mention of Trump by name, but was a stark rebuke to his behavior since the November election loss.
“I think the fact that the three of us are here talking about a peaceful transfer of power speaks to the institutional integrity of our country,” Bush said. Obama called inaugurations “a reminder that we can have fierce disagreements and still recognize each other’s common humanity, and that, as Americans, we have more in common than what separates us.”
Trump spent months making baseless claims that the election was fraudulently stolen from him and ultimately helped spark a deadly uprising at the Capitol. He left the White House without attending Biden’s swearing-in, the first president to skip his successor’s inauguration in 152 years.
Obama, Bush and Clinton recorded their video after accompanying Biden to lay a wreath at the tomb of the unknown soldier after the inauguration. They also recorded a video urging Americans to get vaccinated against the coronavirus. Only 96-year-old Jimmy Carter, who restricted his public events due to the pandemic, and Trump, who had already flown into post-presidential life in Florida, were not there.
Jeffrey Engel, founder and director of the Center for Presidential History at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, said Trump is not a good fit for the club of ex-presidents “because he is temperamental different.”
“People within the club were historically respected by the subsequent presidents. Even Richard Nixon was respected by Bill Clinton and Ronald Reagan and so on for his foreign policy, ”Engel said. “I’m not sure I see a lot of people calling Trump for his strategic advice.”
Former presidents are occasionally called up for major duties.
George H.W.Bush and Clinton teamed up in 2005 to launch a campaign urging Americans to help the victims of the devastating tsunami in Southeast Asia. When Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast, Bush, the father of then President George W. Bush, called on Clinton to raise more for Katrina.
When the elder Bush died in 2018, Clinton wrote, “His friendship is one of the greatest gifts of my life,” much praise given that this was the man he expelled from the White House after a violent campaign in 1992 – making Bush was the only one. president for the past three decades, except Trump.
Obama tapped Clinton and the younger President Bush to boost fundraising efforts for Haiti after the devastating 2010 earthquake. George W. Bush also became close friends with former first lady Michelle Obama, and cameras watched him slide a coughing fit at her as they attended Arizona Sen.’s funeral together. John McCain.
Presidents usually pay the same respect to their predecessors while in office, regardless of party. In 1971, three years before his disgraceful resignation, Richard Nixon went to Texas to participate in the dedication of Lyndon Baines Johnson’s Presidential Library. When the Nixon Library was completed in 1990, then President George HW Bush attended former Presidents Ronald Reagan and Gerald Ford.
Trump’s break with tradition began before his presidency. After his election victory in November 2016, Obama hosted Trump in the White House and pledged to “do everything we can to help you succeed.” Trump replied, “I look forward to being with you many, many more times in the future” – but that never happened.
Instead, Trump falsely accused Obama of bugging him and ruined his predecessor’s record for four years.
Current and former presidents have sometimes disliked each other, and criticism of their successors is not unheard of. Carter criticized the policies of the Republican governments that followed his, Obama scolded Trump while campaigning for Biden, and also criticized George W. Bush’s policies – though Obama was mostly careful not to name his predecessor. Theodore Roosevelt tried to sack his successor, fellow Republican William Howard Taft, by creating his own “Bull Moose” party and running against him again for president.
Still, presidential respect for former presidents goes back even further. The country’s second president, John Adams, was so concerned about tarnishing his predecessor’s legacy that he upheld George Washington’s cabinet appointments.
Trump may have time to build his relationship with his predecessors. He told Brower that he “could see himself befriending Bill Clinton”, noting that the pair used to play golf together.
But the likelihood of him becoming the traditional president he never had during his tenure remains long.
“I think Trump has taken it too far,” Brower said. “I don’t think these former presidents will ever welcome him.”