A lot has changed since Donald Trump left Washington and Joe Biden entered the White House. (Forbes, Marty Swant)
As we now enter into the middle of Joe Biden’s second month in office let’s take a look at what has changed and stayed the same in our nation’s capital. Let’s first start with what has remained the same. Both Donald Trump and Joe Biden live in the White House and have the title “President”. Outside of that, though, a lot has changed as Biden and Trump are two very different types of people.
One of the big things that has changed since Biden took office is the daily press briefing. Since Biden has taken office these briefings have continued to take place daily with press secretary Jen Psaki. However, when Trump was in office these press briefings typically went a little off of the rails as his administration was frequently accused of giving out inaccurate information and was always getting grilled by the press, which pushed Trump to stop them. In addition, Trump ran these briefings like a reality show because he was constantly replacing press secretaries as he went from Sean Spicer to Sarah Sanders, Stephanie Grisham and finally ended with Kayleigh McEnany. This also leads to another difference, which is since Biden has been in the White House on January 20th he has not fired any of his cabinet members or called any of them out on Twitter. When Trump was in office, calling people out on Twitter took place weekly as he would always make fun of one of the people he hired if they disagreed with him about something. Biden does not abuse his Twitter account by calling out his cabinet members and spreading false information. Instead, he is trying to heal the country from COVID-19 and make it about all Americans rather than Democrats versus Republicans.
Speaking of COVID-19, there are a lot of differences between how Trump and Biden have handled the pandemic. First, Trump wanted everyone to believe that COVID was not that bad and was just like the flu. He also said that it will get better when it gets warmer outside, which will make it go away and ultimately COVID will magically disappear like a miracle. Biden has taken a different approach where he is telling the public upfront that it is bad, and it is going to get worse. Biden is taking this approach because he wants to treat the American people like intelligent adults and set the right expectations. He believes if people get told what to do and why they should do then people will listen and follow the directions. However, he has also taken more action to try to start the vaccine rollout. For example, Biden set a goal for one million vaccines a day and is already well ahead of that schedule as the United States has passed 50 million people vaccinated. The United States will also be the first country to vaccinate 100 million people, which puts the US on track to pass Biden’s original goal of 100 million people vaccinated in the first 100 days in office.
Something else that has been different since Biden took office is that he has held ceremonies to honor and remember the people that have died during the pandemic. He first did this on the night of the inauguration by holding a ceremony at the Lincoln Memorial when the US was at 400,000 lives lost. Biden also held a candle lighting ceremony last Monday outside the White House where he gave an emotional speech comparing people losing loved ones during the pandemic to when he lost his son Beau as the US reached 500,000 dead. Trump acknowledged the dead sometimes, but he was also too busy downplaying the virus which resulted in him not getting the resources necessary to stop the spread of COVID-19.
Trump was also opposed to wearing a mask and was rarely seen wearing one. He went as far to mock Joe Biden and the media for wearing one. He also said that mask wearing was a choice that Americans can make rather than something we should all do to be responsible citizens. Since Biden has taken over, he is always seen wearing a mask and tries to convince the American people to also wear one to stop the spread of the virus. In addition, with Biden now in office everybody in the White House is required to wear a mask and all media members must be tested daily. This is drastically different from when Trump was in office where no one was seen wearing a mask and the media was not tested.
Another major difference between the Trump administration and the Biden administration is diversity. Biden’s cabinet is historically diverse, beginning with the first female, African American and Asian American vice president in United States history. In addition, he also appointed the first transgender person for a Senate confirmed position in Pennsylvania health secretary Rachel Levine as his assistant secretary of health. He also tapped South Bend, Indiana mayor Pete Buttigieg to be on his cabinet as his Secretary of Transportation, making him the first openly gay person to be on a cabinet in US history as well as the first millennial and youngest person at the age of 39 to be on Biden’s cabinet. Biden also appointed Janet Yellen to be the first woman to lead the Treasury Department and Deb Haaland who, if confirmed, would be the first Native American in a president’s cabinet. In the previous administration, Donald Trump had his cabinet dominated by males and white people. In addition, a lot of Trump’s cabinet was run by people with little to no political experience. This included energy executive and the original secretary of state Rex Tillerson and Betsy DeVos who was the secretary of education.
Another difference between Biden and Trump is that with Joe Biden in the White House there are the return of dogs in the Oval Office. Donald Trump was the first president to not have any dogs in 130 years since William McKinley, who instead had several kittens, roosters and a parrot.
Lastly, one of the bigger differences between Joe Biden and Donald Trump is that in Trump’s presidency he was all about “America First”, which meant that he did not care if it impacted our relationship with our allies. In fact, he even took the US out of the Paris Climate Accord, which helped to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. However, Biden signed an executive order a couple of hours after being sworn in as the 46th President on January 20th to put America back into the Paris Climate Accord. Biden has also made it clear since he has taken office that America is back to leading on the world stage and willing to work with our allies to be able to regain their trust to work together to overcome global warming and the pandemic. In addition, Biden made it clear that he was more forceful with Vladimir Putin of Russia, explaining that the days of interfering in elections, poisoning US citizens and cyber attacking are over. This is a very different tone from what Donald Trump had towards Russia where he was friends with Putin and was always afraid to speak out against him.
As you can see, Donald Trump and Joe Biden are two very different types of personalities. Trump is more in your face and says whatever he wants with no filter. On the other hand, Biden thinks about what he is going to say and as a result comes across more traditionally presidential. Overall, a lot has changed since Biden has taken office.