The presidential tradition dates back to the late 1980s.
President Donald Trump on Tuesday evening revealed the general content of a letter that was left behind by former President Joe Biden in the Oval Office’s Resolute Desk.
Trump described the contents of Biden’s letter to him as “very nice” and “inspirational,” although he did not go into details about it.
“It was a very nice letter,” Trump told reporters during a news conference, his first after returning to office as president. “It was a little bit of an inspirational-type letter. Enjoy it, do a good job. Important, very important. How important the job is.”
The president added that he might release the letter to the public in the near future because the content was “a positive—for him.” He then stated, “I appreciated the letter.”
The letter was discovered on Monday evening in the Resolute Desk as Trump was signing a slew of executive orders while bantering with reporters about various topics. A reporter asked him whether Biden left the letter to him, which was simply addressed to “47,” referring to Trump.
“He may have. Don’t they leave it in the desk? I don’t know,” Trump told reporters before he found an envelope with the note. “It could have been years before we found this thing,” he said to the reporter.
The tradition of an outgoing president leaving a letter to the forthcoming commander-in-chief is a relatively recent phenomenon. In 1989, President Ronald Reagan left a note to his successor, President George H.W. Bush.
Since then, outgoing presidents have left notes behind. All subsequent presidents—including Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Biden, and Trump—have left letters to their successors.
Biden and Trump are in a unique situation due to Trump becoming the only second president to serve nonconsecutive terms in office, with the only other to do so being President Grover Cleveland in the late 19th century.
After Trump left office for the first time in January 2021, he left a note to Biden, the former president confirmed at the time.
