Three of the worst presidential transitions in modern U.S. history were the handovers from Ronald Reagan to George H.W. Bush, Barack Obama to Donald Trump, and the swap from Trump to Joe Biden, according to a good government organization.
Max Stier, president and CEO of the nonpartisan group Partnership for Public Service, offered up those presidential transitions as cautionary tales in a call with reporters Monday now that the next presidential transition effort is underway.
The federal government Tuesday offered office space and support to the transition teams of Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Trump as both candidates vie to take over control of the executive branch in January. As that formal transition process proceeds, Stier and Valerie Smith Boyd, who leads the partnership’s Center for Presidential Transitions, described how transitions went awry in the past.
When the sitting vice president, Bush, won the 1988 election, there was confusion among political appointees about who would be keeping their jobs when one GOP administration swapped out for another.
