What Happens After a Presidential Election?

Liam Heffernan: 00:00:17

It's the week after the year before, as months of primary elections followed by months more of campaigning with conventions, crises and everything in between finally came to a head. Last Tuesday, hundreds of millions of Americans went to the polls to vote in the presidential election.

Billions of dollars were spent, thousands of hours of media coverage was dedicated and. And eventually the winner is confirmed. Or so we hope by now. But then what?

In this episode, we take a closer look at the following two months as I ask what happens after a presidential election. Welcome to America A history podcast.

I'm Liam Heffernan and every week we answer a different question to understand the people, the places and the events that make the USA what it is today. To discuss this, I am joined by our resident election expert, Dr. Emma Long.

She's also the Associate professor of American History and Politics at the University of East Anglia. But you've heard that so many times by now. Emma, welcome back.

Emma Long: 00:01:42

Thanks for the invite to be back, Liam.

Liam Heffernan: 00:01:44

Yes, I mean, it's just a standing invitation at this point, but we're there, we're kind of. The elections happened.

Emma Long: 00:01:53

Yes, that's it. And I mean, we're recording this a little bit before it's happened, so we're sort of, we're hoping it's finished, but we can't say for definite.

But yes, I mean, it does seem to have come. We seem to have been talking about it for a very long time, time, and suddenly you're at that moment, you're like, oh, yeah, it finally came out.

It kind of felt like I was going to be talking about it forever, but. But of course we are. Well, we are not in that, in that sense. So, yes, we hopefully with a winner and a transition process sort of underway.

And yeah, yeah, we're in that, that process where we're, we're handing over from one administration to another.

Liam Heffernan: 00:02:33

It just, it feels quite anticlimactic this, this period, doesn't it?

Because the, the US election goes on for so long that I feel like one of the reasons that I wanted to touch on this on the, on, on this podcast is because this period between the election happening and the new or incumbent president being then sworn in in January, this whole bit in between gets ignored. But there's actually a process that happens, isn't there?

Emma Long: 00:02:59

There is a process, yeah. And actually, you know, it's quite a long process if you think about it.

I mean, if you think about the UK election, right, you know, the election day, if the Prime Minister's party loses, they're out the new Prime Minister, Prime Minister's in. Bearing in mind, of course, they live in Downing Street. That's like you're out. That's it. Bang.

Next, same day, you know, the US has a couple of months. You know, they get an outgoing president, gets time to pack up their books and their belongings and move out in a leisurely fashion.

Liam Heffernan: 00:03:32

It's a bigger house, though, to be fair.

Emma Long: 00:03:34

It is a bigger house. I don't know. I'm not quite sure what the size of the flat, you know, the family.

Liam Heffernan: 00:03:40

Yeah.

Emma Long: 00:03:40

Accommodation is. But yes, there's an awful lot of people working in the. Working in the White House that you need to sort out.

But it's probably also worth remembering that while two months is a long time, it used to be longer.

So before the: 1930

t, because in the election of: 1932

Liam Heffernan: 00:04:48

Days of, you know, the White house and Washington D.C. being very much the focal point of U.S. politics.

And I realize that's quite a small window because the White House was built only a few years after Washington left office. But was that process still quite defined or was it a little bit more sort of fluid?

Emma Long: 00:05:09

The process of transition has, in it ineffectively, in itself been a. In a process of transition over. Over time. Right.

And I think in many ways it actually ties to the growth of the executive branch that we've touched on in previous episodes. Right. So when Washington was. Was elected, and then obviously when he.

office after the election of: 1800

So not just the president and the vice president, but the whole range of executive agencies that form the executive branch today that we're used to, it didn't exist. It wasn't there. The president was the chief executive, but the president wasn't all the other things that we now think of as a president.

So, yes, the transition of one president to another was important.

lection of Abraham Lincoln in: 1860

I mean, it's fundamentally huge because it's part of what precipitates the coming of the Civil War the following year. So I'm not saying they're not, they're not important.

But in terms of kind of transitions and the kinds of size of staff and the kind of things that think of as being part of the modern transition, it was relatively more straightforward because the executive branch wasn't so big.

In fact, it seems I was doing some reading around this and it seems that actually that even the term transition doesn't get used before the middle of the 20th century. And I think that's actually, that's really interesting. It seems to start to get used in a really serious fashion with the Truman administration.

hands power to Eisenhower in: 1952

And it seems to me that that's important because actually that seems to reflect the massive growth of the executive branch under Franklin Roosevelt, Truman's predecessor.

It's starting earlier than that, but really it's Franklin Roosevelt and his response to the, the Great Depression with the New Deal, which creates the so called Alphabet agencies to administer these massive programs that really begins to see the enormous growth of the executive branch and the development of the agencies that we know of now.

So examples include things like Health, Education and Welfare and Department of Homeland Security, Department of the treasury for ice, the Immigration and Customs Service and Education, Health, you know, all of, all of these, all of these agencies that we're, we're probably used to hearing about, but not thinking too much about the sort of cabinet position secretaries head up these, these enormous departments.

exist before roosevelt in the: 1930

Right now the transition is the president and the vice president and several hundred, if not thousand members of the executive branch who have to hand over control or at least the headship of all of those agencies as well.

So I think it's interesting that terminology and when it comes in and now transition is a huge project that takes the two months and actually many more because presidential teams start thinking about transition very early on in the process. So it's a big undertaking. It's really quite a logistical feat actually in many ways. But it's changed as the executive branch has changed.

Liam Heffernan: 00:09:30

Yeah. And presumably it's a bigger undertaking when the White House changes hands to a different party.

Like for instance, if Harris wins, I'm going to assume that there's going to be a lot less upheaval switching from Biden to Harris. Is there would be. If Biden transfers to Trump.

Emma Long: 00:09:54

Yeah.

And if, you know, if as well, you know, if you've got a two term president who's continuing on, there's going to be less upheaval and less change too. But they do often have transition teams. Right.

And there is a process that they need to follow and they are advised to think of it as not just a continuation of a presidency, but as a transition from a first term to a second term. So there are things that need to change.

But yes, I mean, when you're changing from one president to another, particularly if it's a change of party, but even if it's just a change of person, they're going to bring like, you know, that they themselves, you know, are going to change and the people that they bring with them will change.

And while that there may be some continuity, but there may also be some change if they're changing party, you know, so if Trump, you know, if Harris wins, there will be some change. Some of it maybe may well be significant.

which governs this, passed in: 1963

They didn't think of anything particularly exciting to call it. So it sort of does what it says on the tiny.

But it requires the General Services Administration within the federal government to start planning for the transition and it starts a year before the election.

So this process for them is already in effect and they will have started it, obviously on the assumption that Biden was running again, because that's what we all thought. Right. So it happens regardless of whether there's a change in power or not.

So some of it is similar and some of it will change, but yes, inevitably a bigger transition when you've got a change of party.

Liam Heffernan: 00:11:53

And so with that in mind, how much support is there from the Federal government in aiding that transition. And that feels like a really weird way of putting it because obviously the President is the federal government at that point.

And it's like, you know, I guess it's a weird one because taking the instance of Biden, he's an incumbent President, but he's, you know, he's stepping down. Is it just kind of like, okay, pack up and get on with it or what?

Emma Long: 00:12:26

No, because I think you have to remember that the thing, if you think about it as the executive branch, it's easier to think about. Right. These agencies are staffed by a lot of people who are effective, who are civil servants. Right. They're not political appointments.

So the heads of these are political appointments.

And one of the things that a presidential transition team is doing is trying to work out who they're going to appoint to be the heads of all these departments as well as lots of others.

But the staff that work sort of below the heads are mostly civil servant appointments who serve like in the UK civil service, and I suspect civil services in other countries too. They are non political. Right. They work with whichever flavor of administration they are required to work with.

And part of this law effectively requires each department to have members who are part of the transition team. Right.

So the idea, because these agencies deal with really huge things, Border security, immigration, Social Security, healthcare, you can't just go, well, we don't like who's coming in, so we're not going to work with them. They'll just have to learn on the job. Right. There are really important things that just need to continue.

And so within these executive branches, there are people who will be appointed or nominated to work as the transition people, and they will work with the appointed people from the incoming President's transition team to try and make sure that that handover from one to the other is as seamless as possible. So that is going on. There are lots and lots of people underneath the President and the Vice President who are working at that.

And yeah, we don't know.

I mean, the: 2020

isenhower won the election in: 1952

So it's been part of the process that as well as what's going on in the executive branch broadly, that there's that kind of the recognition and the acceptance and the respect for the results.

So there's that transfer now that that became even, you know, Obama did that with Trump, even though I'm quite sure that Obama probably felt like not doing that with Trump. But he did, and he extended, you know, that that courtesy which Trump took.

It was different in: 2020

So it's all part of some of it is official. Some of it is the real nitty gritty of making sure that the business of the federal government continues without interruption.

Some of its sort of ceremonial and some of it's interpersonal about personal connections and sort of passing the baton on to the next person. So it's the transition is happening at a lot of different levels at the same time.

And just to give you an idea of this, there is a budget allocated within the federal government to go towards the cost of transition, because obviously, if you've got a lot of people involved in this, you've got to, you know, you've got to pay them. You've got to cover that. There may be expenses in terms of logistics and moving things around.

So the General Services Administration, once somebody is declared the winner of the election, and the General Services Administration acknowledge or recognize that that person has been declared the winner, it automatically frees up and it's about $10 million towards the cost of the transition.

And then the candidate has to pay the ballot whatever is has to pay on top of that for other expenses out of, I guess, campaign funds and all the rest of it.

So in: 2016

From the side of that, in: 2020

So it gives you, I mean, there's a lot of numbers, right, to throw out, but it's really just as a sign of just what kind of size of logistical operation this is to hand over the business of Government from one person to another.

Liam Heffernan: 00:17:48

Yeah. And as you pointed out, you know, we're not just talking about, you know, a few members of staff.

It's, it's hundreds, hundreds of people that are, that are affected by this.

And, and you know, I was going to ask what happens to, you know, any unspent campaign funds, but clearly they, they find a way to, to use that in the transition, I think.

Emma Long: 00:18:08

Yeah. I mean, anything that's unspent from the government side goes back into the treasury budget because they're tax dollars.

Anything from private campaign donations? Sort of. Yeah. Depends on how, what they, the campaign then goes on to do. I mean, private funds that are donated to the parties.

Parties have rules about what then happens to that money that remains unspent at the end of the election. So any funds left over then get distributed according to those rules and regulations.

Liam Heffernan: 00:18:42

Right. So the, when this transition is happening, you know, all money aside, there's going to be that process partly symbolic of the transitioning of power.

As you've got a lame duck president handing over to an incoming president. But at what point does that sort of actual power dynamic sort of start to shift? Is there any sort of transition in the actual handing over of powers?

Emma Long: 00:19:07

It's difficult to say. And I think it depends on the individuals and the circumstances. Right.

So I mean, if you want to take an extreme example, thinking about Obama's last year in office, we've talked about this in the past, right?

Republicans refused to hold Senate hearings on his nominee for the Supreme Court on the grounds that he was a lame duck president who was not running. Again, right? Now that's a fairly extreme example and a long way out.

And there are lots of reasons not to use that as a particular example of broader trends. But you have to remember a couple of things.

One, the president remains the president and the head of state until midday on 20 January, which is when the official handover goes.

So they may not be able to put their weight behind legislation, for example, particularly if, say, the House of Representatives or the Senate or both have changed hands.

There may, I mean, there may be an attempt to try and get things pushed through in kind of the lame duck session, but there's a question about how legitimate that is to try and do that.

And obviously, if you've got one party, as we have at the moment, divided control of Congress, the other party of the incoming party is going to make it hard to do that. But a president remains, still remains, commander in chief of the military, chief diplomat on the world stage.

And if Major international events are taking place. The President is still the person who needs to take action on that.

So there is power there because there has to be, because the country can't be leaderless.

But we do see a diminishing of power, particularly on the domestic front and to some extent on the international front, because people are going to be thinking, well, if I make an agreement with you and, you know, your successor is going to come in, are they going to stick to it? Is a new Congress going to ratify a treaty?

So there is a sort of inevitably, I think, a loss of power, but I think for some there's a bigger loss than others.

Liam Heffernan: 00:21:19

Yeah. And I think, you know, looking back even to the, the Iran hostage crisis that Jimmy Carter dealt with once he lost to Reagan, there was almost that.

It almost seems petulant that they just held off releasing the hostages until Reagan was sworn in. And that just felt like such a, they were making just such a point that Jimmy Carter at that point didn't really have any power anymore, did he?

Emma Long: 00:21:45

Yeah. And of course, the irony of all that is that all the negotiations were done by the Carter administration. Yeah, right.

You know, it was all agreed by Carter, but yes, they, they hold off. So Reagan sort of ends up getting the, the credit for it.

Liam Heffernan: 00:21:57

Yeah.

Emma Long: 00:21:58

So, yes.

And of course, it's, it's one of the things, isn't it, you know, sometimes debates about the, the advantages of having a set date for an election versus what we have, you know, or we have in the UK where a government can call an election within a period of time. Right. They can't go over the five years, but it could call an election earlier than, than that.

It's like the people who live in the country know what, you know, when the election is going to be, but so do all the people everywhere else know when the election is going to be. So, and as the fact we're talking about it testifies, there is a lot of interest internationally in American elections.

So people are paying attention.

And those might be people who, you know, mean the, mean the United States well and want to do things, but feel like they need to hold off so that whatever they want to do has the legitimacy of the incoming administration. But it might also be people who want to do the US harm, who are aware of that as well.

Liam Heffernan: 00:23:01

Sort of going back to the sort of the interpersonal dynamic that you mentioned earlier in this transition of power. You know, it is quite a weird time politically where you've got a lame duck president who officially is still in power, but can't really do anything.

And then an incoming president who doesn't yet have official power, but probably garners a bit more influence and attention than the outgoing.

When you then look at instances like Jan6, it kind of highlights how important having two reasonable individuals is in ensuring a peaceful transition of power. Because actually, with the wrong. If just one of these two individuals isn't fully on board with that, all hell breaks loose.

Emma Long: 00:23:53

Yeah. I mean, democracy works because everybody signs up to it and plays by the rules of the game. Right.

If somebody stops playing by the rules of the game, it stops working. And, you know, we saw a little bit of that on January 6th. I mean, there have been instances of sort of petty responses.

t that Al Gore didn't win the: 2000

I've heard that story a lot, but I've never actually spoken to anybody who was, was in the White House who claimed to have seen it done. So, you know, it's, the story is, is out there, but from my point of view, at least unverified.

those lines. But really, the: 2020

You know, as Republicans currently are arguing, he left the white. And as J.D. vance argued right. In the vice presidential debate, he left the White House. Yes, he did.

It's not like he called up the military as commander in chief and, you know, had them prevent Biden being able to move in and so on.

But there was an awful lot of upheaval in the, you know, in the meantime, between the, between Election Day and then, which did an awful lot of damage to public opinion to issue to, you know, beliefs about election integrity and so on.

Liam Heffernan: 00:25:46

Yeah.

Emma Long: 00:25:46

So, yes, it, you know, it does require one party to recognize that the other has won and to be willing to hand that power over as seamlessly as possible. And it's sort of an idea of, I guess, stewardship. Right.

The idea that you take on the mantle of president when you are elected and you look after it for a period of time and then you, until it's time to hand it on to the next person. And that next person might be the person that you wanted it to be, and it might not. But Your dedication is to the role of that.

I think Obama, in his memoirs, talks a lot about feeling the responsibility of that and seeing the role as that kind of that service to the country, to the government and so on. And it's something that you then pass on. But I think we've seen changing ideas. Right.

About what politics is, and not just at presidential level, but at other levels, too. And this idea of politics as service has diminished in some areas and in some races. So that transition is seen in a different way.

Liam Heffernan: 00:27:07

Yeah.

And I think historically, the assumption has always been that both candidates or the outgoing president and the incoming president would both be, even if politically divided, united in their efforts to maintain some sort of working democracy and a peaceful transition of power. And they'd be very reasonable and follow protocol and do what's expected to ensure that happens.

But actually, the Trump administration has kind of proven that, even though it seems a little bit inefficient to regulate against the anomalies, that's kind of precisely why certain controls and regulations need to be there. Because, you know, Trump as a lame duck president, ended up proving just how dangerous a lame duck president could be.

Emma Long: 00:28:01

Yeah. I mean, we should probably be fair to the people in the administration. Right. And the executive branches who we know were following the rules. Right.

And preparing for the handover and working with the Biden team to try and make sure that things got handed over. So we're not talking about everybody in the administration. Right. Who made this difficult.

We know, and some of them have spoken out about that subsequently, and in the aftermath of the January 6 riots, and others have chosen not to. But, you know, we know from other people that, you know, they were just quietly kind of getting on with their job and what was expected of them.

So I think, you know, amid the criticism, we should be fair to them and say they. They did do what was expected. It was simply and even. I mean, Mike Pence, too. Right. As vice president.

So we're really only talking about Trump and maybe some of his closest advisors who were resisting. But you're right, if someone's got a platform and a kind of dedicated group of supporters, we can see that.

And also, actually, people who might just want to use the opportunity to cause trouble as well, we can see that that can happen. But the president maintains a really powerful platform.

And I think you see that in the fact that many former presidents, whether they're handing over to former vice presidents or they're handing over to. To somebody else or to a different party. Right.

The number of presidents who Former presidents leave office keep a very low profile, at least for a period of time, to allow.

To not take the limelight away or the attention away right from a new administration, even if subsequently they come back onto the national stage and do whatever it is that they, they choose to do. There is almost always a period in which they practically drop out of sight.

And I think that's partly an acknowledgement of a platform that they have.

I mean, you can't tell me that Barack Obama doesn't know that when he puts out a tweet or appears on a TV show or gives a speech that the world isn't watching. And he has been pretty careful, I think, to use that platform in particular ways. George W. Bush has been very quiet since he left office.

And you know, there are reasons around the politics of that.

Carter became more famous really for his humanitarian work and used the platform that he had to sort of work more quietly, you know, behind the scenes to do those kinds of things.

But yeah, I think it is a recognition that once you've held that role, you are a public figure and, you know, you are watched as such, even if you no longer hold the role.

Liam Heffernan: 00:31:09

Yeah. And again, it's that symbolicness of officially retaining the title of president for life.

With that comes an expectation, a responsibility to conduct yourself in a certain way that represents not just yourself, but the country that you did serve as president for.

Emma Long: 00:31:28

Yeah, yeah. I think it's that dual role. Right.

You know, on one hand you are a political appointee with a political agenda and a platform and things that you want to get done, but you're also head of state. And once you're out of office, you may move away from some of the more political, like partisan party political things.

But that sort of head of state role, or the legacy, should we say, of the head of state role never quite goes away, I think. And you know, former presidents have, you have really used that for good in many ways or sort of used it in very low key ways.

But I think for in terms of what we're talking about, it is a recognition that they may, you know, they may have had this lame duck period before they left office. And there may have been things that they weren't able to do that they wanted to do, but they can still have influence.

Liam Heffernan: 00:32:30

Yes, indeed. And of course, as you said, you know, there's so much about relationships that, you know, drive politics.

And the president has spent at least four years building a lot of very meaningful relationships around the world with a lot of very powerful people. And that doesn't just disappear overnight, does it?

Emma Long: 00:32:47

No, I like to think there's some kind of World Leaders WhatsApp group and they just all get bumped into the former world leaders WhatsApp group when they're.

Liam Heffernan: 00:32:55

National security issues with that.

Emma Long: 00:32:58

Can you imagine? But yeah, of course. And I mean, we see that. Right.

Occasionally when former leaders happen to meet up at some other event or whatever, there's a weird kind of nostalgia because whether we liked them or not, now they're former, we don't have to worry about them in quite the same way. And there's this world, you know, with rose tinted glasses thing that goes back. Oh, look, think back to when they were leaders of whenever.

But yeah, it's. Yeah, I like the idea of them, you know, having these discussions about what's going on in the world.

Liam Heffernan: 00:33:33

Yeah, that'll be lovely, wouldn't it?

And, you know, I think whatever the outcome of the election, whether we know it or not by now, at the time this episode goes out, there's, it's definitely going to be very interesting to keep an eye on what happens. I think anything that involves Trump one way or the other has proven somewhat controversial.

Emma Long: 00:33:53

Yeah, I agree.

And I think whatever the outcome of the election, it's probably worth remembering that actually the transition process is sort of part of the electoral process. It doesn't just end on election Day.

It actually runs all the way through to January 20th when the, the result of the election is in effect put into or comes into reality.

Liam Heffernan: 00:34:21

Yeah.

Emma Long: 00:34:22

Right. So it may drop out of the news a little bit. It certainly won't be covered with the kind of intensity that the rest of it has been covered from.

In a normal presidential year, Right.

There might be the, the occasional headline about meeting or, you know, the announcement of who a nomination for a particular cabinet post is going to be and those kinds of things, but it's going on behind the scenes, but in very, very sort of intense ways for the people who are involved in it.

Liam Heffernan: 00:34:53

Absolutely. And not just America, but us and the whole world will be watching to see how this all plays out over the next few months.

But, Emma, you now finally get to have a little hibernation from the podcast for a couple of months.

Emma Long: 00:35:09

Listeners breathe a sigh of relief that they don't have to listen to me for a little while until you see fit to bring me back for something.

Liam Heffernan: 00:35:18

Yeah, well, you can rest until the inauguration and we'll see you again.

Emma Long: 00:35:22

Okay.

Liam Heffernan: 00:35:24

But yeah, for listeners as well, you might be or might not be glad to know that we are done with politics for a little while. So get your Christmas lights out and forget about the last few months for a little while.

So we're going to wrap up this and indeed all of our election coverage. And again, thank you so much Emma for joining me for this episode and for all the many others that you've done over the last few months.

As always, we'll put some useful links in the show notes and Emma, remind everyone where can they connect with you?

Emma Long: 00:35:55

As regular listeners will know, I am not on social media so the easiest way to find me is searching for me through the UEA webpages where you'll find my email and to get in touch that way.

Liam Heffernan: 00:36:07

Awesome. And I am still on X so come find me there at thisisthehef and on LinkedIn too.

And if you enjoy the podcast, wherever you're listening to this, do just take 10 seconds out your day to leave us a rating and a review because it bumps us up the algorithms helps people find us and that makes us very happy. And also click follow as well so that all future episodes appear in your feed. Thank you all very much for listening and goodbye.