NEW: President-elect Joe Biden's team is worried that President Donald Trump will force Biden to purge the outgoing commander in chief's political appointees who don't resign by Inauguration Day. by @rbravender ($) in @Politicsinsider businessinsider.com/biden-trump-ap…
Having to fire a whole bunch of people on his first day on the job — though not illegal — wouldn't be a good look for Biden, who rode to victory with a promise to unify the country, a message he's expected to reiterate when he's sworn in on January 20.
Voluntary departures are standard & expected during a transition. The CoS for the outgoing president asks the roughly 4K political appointees to hand over resignation letters that take effect on Inauguration Day. That clears the way for the new POTUS to hire his own people.
But this is no ordinary presidential transition. Trump still hasn't conceded the election to Biden and has even reportedly suggested that he might not leave the White House the day his successor is sworn in.
So Biden's team is anxiously watching to see whether current White House chief of staff Mark Meadows requests those resignation letters to avoid a scenario where the new president has to oust remaining Trump officials.
"It just makes things messy," a source close to the Biden transition told Insider this week. "Biden's first act would be to fire everybody."
It's important to ensure that an incoming president can pick their own team, said Ken Duberstein, who was President Ronald Reagan's chief of staff in 1989 during the transition to the George H. W. Bush administration.
"You've got to provide a clean sweep if the incoming president wants it," he said. The outgoing Reagan admin promised all the political appointees that if they sent in their resignations by Inaug Day they'd get a personalized letter from Reagan thanking them for their service.
A refusal by Trump to ask his appointees to step down would be another norm "that this president tears up," said Wiliam Reilly, who led the US Environmental Protection Agency under the George H. W. Bush administration.
f Biden winds up firing Trump staffers, "I hope the country understands when he does that it's to get his own people and that ordinarily, he wouldn't have to," Reilly said.
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