President Donald Trump on Tuesday called a letter that former President Joe Biden left inside the Oval Office’s Resolve Desk “an inspiration,” and told reporters he may someday release the “really great” memo. He teased the group.
President Trump spoke about the letter, found inside the Resolute Desk, on Monday during a press conference announcing $500 billion in investments in artificial intelligence infrastructure, with the help of Fox News senior White House correspondent Peter Doocy. asked a question.
President Trump told reporters, “It was a very nice letter.” “It was a bit of an inspirational letter. Have fun, do a good job. It’s important, it’s very important. How important the work is.”
The president added that he values the letter so highly that he may make it public.
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President Donald Trump holds up a letter left for him by former President Joe Biden on his resolution desk as he signs an executive order in the Oval Office of the White House on Monday, January 20, 2025 in Washington, D.C. (AP Photo/Evan) Vucci)
“Writing this document was a positive thing for him,” Trump continued. “I appreciated the letter.”
On Monday, as President Biden was signing a series of executive orders in front of a crowd of reporters in the Oval Office, Trump asked if Doocy had left a letter for him, and then addressed the letter to “47.” I discovered it.
President Trump found the letter at his Resolute desk after Fox News senior White House correspondent Peter Doocy asked if Biden had left a note. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
“He might have. Don’t they leave it in the desk? I don’t know,” Trump told Doocy before discovering the white envelope. “Thank you, Peter. It may have taken me years to find this.”
President Trump teased reporters that they should read the document together before withdrawing governance. He said he would open the letter late Monday night.
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The tradition of presidential letters to their successors began in 1989, when President Ronald Reagan left the White House after two terms and was succeeded by former President George H.W. Bush.
A handwritten letter left by a former president to his successor, photographed Saturday, Jan. 18, 2025, in Washington. Every president since Ronald Reagan has left a memo to his successor. (AP Photo/John Elswick)
President Bush continued the tradition, even though he lost the White House to former President Bill Clinton after just one term. This tradition continues to this day through presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Trump, and Biden.
But Biden was the first president in the unique position of writing a letter to his successor and his predecessor, to whom he had written a memo four years earlier. Trump is the first president to serve non-consecutive terms since Grover Cleveland in the late 1800s.
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Biden said Trump left him a “very generous letter,” but he has so far refused to release what Trump wrote, saying it is private.
Fox News Digital’s Greg Wehner contributed to this report.
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