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The White House announced on Friday that President Joe Biden does not plan to raise the American flag to full-staff for President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration.
Former President Jimmy Carter passed away on December 29 at the age of 100 in Plains, Georgia. Under U.S. flag code, the death of a sitting or former president is marked by lowering the flag to half-staff for 30 days at public buildings, military posts, and other official locations. Since Trump is set to be sworn in as the 47th U.S. president on January 20—within the 30-day mourning period—this creates a rare circumstance where the flag may remain at half-staff during a presidential inauguration.
Although flag code traditions are not legally binding, Biden has expressed no intention of altering the protocol. At a press briefing on Friday, White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre was asked if Biden might reconsider keeping the flags at half-staff for the occasion. She replied with a simple “No,” offering no further comment.
Trump criticized the decision, saying Democrats were the only ones celebrating it. “The Democrats are all ‘giddy’ about our magnificent American Flag potentially being at ‘half mast’ during my Inauguration. They think it’s so great, and are so happy about it because, in actuality, they don’t love our Country, they only think about themselves,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. He added, “Nobody wants to see this, and no American can be happy about it.”
Historically, there have been accommodations to raise flags temporarily for significant events during periods of national mourning. For example, President Richard Nixon raised flags to full-staff on February 13, 1973, to honor the return of prisoners of war from Vietnam, even though they had been lowered for the death of Lyndon B. Johnson three weeks earlier.
President Carter, who served a single term from 1977 to 1981, will receive a state funeral in Washington on January 9. Trump has confirmed his plans to attend. The late president will lie in state in the Capitol Rotunda starting the afternoon of January 7 through the morning of January 9, with a 24-hour public visitation beginning on January 8. He will be laid to rest in Plains, Georgia, beside his wife, Rosalynn.
