WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (Reuters) – President-elect Donald Trump flew to Washington on Saturday aboard a U.S. military aircraft provided by President Joe Biden in preparation for his inauguration, as the outgoing president stressed his commitment to tradition transition specifications.
Trump will arrive in Washington on Saturday night to participate in festivities for his return to office on Monday.
For the occasion, he ditched his usual Navy and crimson Trump One aircraft for the government plane Biden sent to Florida. Biden has stressed to his officials that they must work with Trump’s transition team, a sharp contrast to the last transition when Trump refused to attend the inauguration or acknowledge Biden’s victory.
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Both planes were parked on the tarmac at Palm Beach International Airport before Trump departed on Saturday. Trump’s son Eric and Eric’s wife Lala boarded a private jet.
During the less than three-hour flight to Washington Dulles International Airport, Trump will fly aboard a specially configured Boeing 757-200 aircraft in its signature blue and white with “The United States of America” ” words.
His daughter Ivanka and her husband Jared Kushner were spotted boarding the plane on Saturday afternoon.
The aircraft is the same aircraft known as Air Force Two flown by the vice president, but is also used by the first lady, Cabinet members and other senior officials.
It is common for president-elects to fly to inaugurations on government-provided planes, but not Biden.
Biden had originally planned to arrive by train in 2021, but the plan was canceled after the Secret Service raised security concerns after thousands of Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, in an effort to overturn his election defeat.
According to people familiar with the matter, the Trump administration did not provide a plane, and Biden ultimately traveled to Washington on a private jet.
Photos of Trump arriving in the Washington area for his first term in office in 2017 show that he was using a similar U.S. aircraft.
The White House and the Air Force could not immediately be reached for comment.
(Reporting by Nathan Layne, Trevor Hunnicutt and David Shepardson; Editing by Heather Timmons and Deepa Babington)
