Outgoing U.S. President Donald Trump touted his administration’s accomplishments and wished incoming President-elect Joe Biden “luck” in a farewell address released Tuesday.
In the pre-recorded speech released Tuesday afternoon, Trump said his administration “did what we came here to do — and so much more.”
Trump said his administration “restored American strength at home — and American leadership abroad,” and “built the greatest economy in the world.”
However, the numbers show it wasn’t the greatest in U.S. history. And he is the first president since Herbert Hoover in the Depression to leave office with fewer jobs than when he started.
The outgoing president said he is “especially proud to be the first president in decades who has started no new wars.”
“Above all, we have reasserted the sacred idea that in America, the government answers to the people. We restored the idea that in America, no one is forgotten — because everyone matters and everyone has a voice,” he said.
Trump also touted his administration’s handling of the novel coronavirus pandemic despite the country having seen more than 401,000 deaths associated with the virus and over 24.2 million infections.
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“When our nation was hit with the terrible pandemic, we produced not one, but two vaccines with record-breaking speed, and more will quickly follow,” he said. “They said it couldn’t be done but we did it. They call it a ‘medical miracle.’”
The farewell address comes as Biden and Vice-president-elect Kamala Harris are scheduled to be sworn-in to the country’s highest office on Wednesday.
Trump gave a small nod to the incoming Biden administration, but did not mention the Democrat by name.
“This week, we inaugurate a new administration and pray for its success in keeping America safe and prosperous,” he said.
“We extend our best wishes and we also want them to have luck, a very important word,” he continued.
However, the outgoing president said as he hands power over to Biden, “the movement we started is only just the beginning.”
Trump still has yet to formally concede his election loss, claiming repeatedly — without providing evidence — that Biden’s victory was the product of mass voter fraud.
Election officials across the country, and members of the government have confirmed there was no evidence of mass fraud or irregularities.
Trump, who became the first president in the country’s history to be impeached twice, has said he will not attend the inauguration ceremony.
Outgoing Vice-President Mike Pence is planning to attend, according to his official schedule.
Trump has largely remained out of the spotlight in the days since Jan. 6 when thousands of his supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol building leaving five people, including a Capitol police officer, dead.
“All Americans were horrified by the assault on our Capitol,” he said in the address. “Political violence is an attack on everything we cherish as Americans. It can never be tolerated.”
Trump is now facing a trial in the U.S. Senate over his alleged actions in inciting the protesters to storm the Capitol, something experts say Trump can still face consequences for even if he is no longer commander-in-chief.
In a statement of her own posted to Twitter on Tuesday, Trump’s daughter and aide Ivanka Trump, said it was “the honour of a lifetime to serve our nation as an Advisor to the President.”
“I am so proud of what we have accomplished and excited for the future,” she said. “I came to Washington to fight for American families and I leave feeling I’ve done that.
”Unlike her father, Ivanka named the members of the incoming administration.
“As Americans we must all pray for their success,” she said.
-With a file from the Associated Press
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