President Joe Biden hadn’t looked this happy in months. Only days after President-elect Donald Trump delivered one of the greatest comebacks in the history of the United States, Biden and Trump sat comfortably next to a roaring fire in the White House. And they were smiling. 

“Welcome back,” Biden told Trump in a congratulatory tone. “I’m looking forward to having, like we said, a smooth transition.” Trump flashed his trademark smile and thanked Biden for what could only be described as an olive branch from the 46th president.

The scene was nothing like that which greeted Trump when he visited with President Barack Obama at the White House in 2016. While Obama had appeared glum and muted, Biden had the look of a man who had just reconnected with an old friend. 

The reviews across 𝕏 agreed—Biden appeared jubilant as he sat across from the man his party repeatedly labeled Hitler redux. One viral AI meme showed the two sharing ice cream and riding on a tandem motorbike. Another overlayed a grinning Biden atop an Election Day map which showed the United States blanketed in red. 

The former adversaries spent the better part of their two-hour meeting amicably chatting and smiling for White House photographers. When it was all said and done, Trump posed with Biden and First Lady Jill Biden. Everyone wore the knowing grin of a job well done. However much the two men may still disagree politically, there was one thing they could finally agree on—at least Harris and her team of backstabbers wouldn’t be occupying the big house on Pennsylvania Avenue. 

You don’t have to like Biden to recognize that the Democrats, and Harris specifically, did him dirty. Instead of allowing Biden to exit the stage on his own terms, he was sent in front of the American people like a lamb to the slaughter and made a spectacle of at his first and only debate with Trump this cycle. In one brutal exchange that will forever symbolize the ghost years of Biden’s presidency, the 81-year-old completely lost track of his thoughts, stumbling to an incomprehensible conclusion. 

“I really don’t know what he said at the end of that sentence,” Trump responded. “I don’t think he knows what he said either.”

The truth had been laid bare for the entire country to see. Biden was a shell of his former self during the June debate. His lackeys had spent the better part of four years gaslighting anyone who dared to point out the obvious, but the obvious was suddenly undeniable. There was no turning back. 

The Democrat elite unceremoniously dumped Biden (who by all accounts fought to the bitter end) and installed a woman who had never won anything outside the soft, blue belly of America’s most liberal state. They paid for it dearly, as Vice President Kamala Harris was soundly defeated on Election Day. Rep. Nancy Pelosi, who at 84 just announced her reelection bid, acknowledged this week that the Democratic Party mucked the Election by refusing to stage a fair and open presidential primary when it became clear Biden was cooked. 

Those who followed the final months of Biden’s shadow presidency noticed an unmistakable change in his tone and tenor toward Trump. On the anniversary of September 11, Biden visited a Volunteer Fire Department in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. When an audience member implored him to wear a Trump 2024 hat, Biden cracked a grin, grabbed the ball cap, and placed it atop his head.

Though White House staff were quick to dismiss the stunt, the fact it occurred the morning after Trump’s only debate with Harris left little doubt in the minds of those following the ebbs and flows of the race that this was personal. Here was Biden at his most ruthless, giving a giant F-U to the establishment, eking out whatever sweet revenge he could against the coup plotters.

As Election Day approached, the Harris camp went out of its way to distance itself physically from Biden. Though Harris kept much of the same troubling platform that had sunken Biden’s approval numbers, her team waved off every attempt by the president to join her on the campaign trail. Given what now appears to be the inevitable results of the race, it was a cold shoulder not required. But she gave it anyway. 

And though it’s difficult to reason that Biden’s support on the campaign trail would have affected the race in any meaningful way, his presence would have at least signaled a cohesive brand to Democratic voters. Instead, Harris ditched the Bidens and went it alone. The party, already fractured, only became more unglued as Harris failed to find footing on the national stage. 

As the dust settled in the wee morning hours of Wednesday, November 6, one could easily imagine Joe and Jill cackling as the results rolled in. The party that abandoned them had suffered greatly at the ballot box. Harris made a mockery of the Bidens, and now America made a mockery of her. All over the country, Americans roundly rejected the cackler from San Francisco. Unburdened by what had been, Biden got the last laugh. 

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