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Will Trump be welcomed to 'ex-presidents' club'? Obama, Bush and Clinton don't even mention him in speech

Trump 'kind of laughed at the very notion that he would be accepted in the presidents club'

Donald Trump seemingly does not fit into the 'ex-Presidents' club: the cadre of former commanders-in-chief who revere the presidency enough to put aside often bitter political differences and even join together in a common cause. On Saturday, January 23, an Associated Press report noted that members of the ex-presidents club “pose together for pictures. They smile and pat each other on the back while milling around historic events, or sit somberly side by side at VIP funerals. They take on special projects together. They rarely criticize one another and tend to offer even fewer harsh words about their White House successors.”

But Trump is unlikely to join in with this political tradition. In fact, Kate Andersen Brower, who interviewed Trump in 2019 for her book ‘Team of Five: The Presidents’ Club in the Age of Trump’ said: “He kind of laughed at the very notion that he would be accepted in the presidents club. He was like, ‘I don’t think I’ll be accepted.'” And Trump is not the only one acknowledging that. The club's other members don't much want him either. Or so they seem to subtly convey. Former Presidents Barack Obama, George W Bush, and Bill Clinton recently recorded a three-minute video from Arlington National Cemetery after President Joe Biden's inauguration. In the video, they praised peaceful presidential succession as a core of American democracy. The segment, however, made no mention of Trump. 

“I think the fact that the three of us are standing here, talking about a peaceful transfer of power, speaks to the institutional integrity of our country,” Bush said. Obama called inaugurations “a reminder that we can have fierce disagreements and yet recognize each other’s common humanity, and that, as Americans, we have more in common than what separates us."

Obama, Bush and Clinton recorded their video after accompanying Biden to lay a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier following the inauguration. Only 96-year-old Jimmy Carter, who has limited his public events because of the coronavirus pandemic, and Trump, who had already flown to post-presidential life in Florida, wasn't there. Speaking to the Associated Press, Jeffrey Engel, the founding director of the Center for Presidential History at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, said Trump was not a good fit for the ex-presidents club "because he’s temperamentally different.”

“People within the club historically have been respected by ensuing presidents. Even Richard Nixon was respected by Bill Clinton and by Ronald Reagan and so on, for his foreign policy," Engel said. "I’m not sure I see a whole lot of people calling up Trump for his strategic advice.”

Trump's break with tradition, the Associated Press noted, began even before his presidency did. After his election win in November 2016, Obama hosted Trump at the White House promising to “do everything we can to help you succeed.” While Trump responded, “I look forward to being with you many, many more times in the future,” he did not follow through. “I think Trump has taken it too far," Brower said. "I don’t think that these former presidents will welcome him at any point.”