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By DARLENE SUPERVILLE
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump has added a Presidential Walk of Fame to the exterior of the White House, featuring portraits of each of the previous commanders-in-chief — except for one.
Instead of a headshot of Joe Biden, the Republican incumbent instead hung a photo of an autopen signing the Democrat’s name — a reference to Trump’s frequent allegation that the former president was addled by the end of his term in office and not really the one making decisions.
The snub amounts to the latest attempt by Trump to delegitimize a predecessor he routinely belittles, including in front of more than 100 world leaders on Tuesday at the United Nations General Assembly gathering. Trump has never acknowledged his own defeat to Biden in the 2020 election, instead falsely chalking up the outcome to voter fraud.
Trump had previously signaled he would represent Biden with an autopen on the Presidential Walk of Fame. Trump has alleged without evidence that Biden administration officials might have forged their boss’s signature by using the autopen and taken broad actions he wasn’t aware of.
He’s also cast doubt on the validity of pardons and other documents that Biden signed with an autopen, even though other presidents before him have also relied on the device to sign key papers. A key Republican-led House committee also is investigating the Biden administration’s autopen use.
White House staff sent out a burst of social media posts Wednesday afternoon gleefully promoting the finished project. The media may get its first in-person glimpse of the Walk of Fame when Trump hosts a dinner Wednesday night on the new Rose Garden patio that sits adjacent to the West Wing Collonad on which the portraits hang.
The addition of the Walk of Fame is the latest in a series of design changes he’s made at the White House since resuming office. He’s also added gold flourishes to the Oval Office walls, installed massive new flagpoles on both lawns, replaced the grass in the Rose Garden with patio stone and started construction on a massive new ballroom.
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