Me and the President's Men

As this is published, the Honorable Donald John Trump is being sworn in as the Forty-Seventh President of the United States. Most of you will be glued to your screens to watch the formalities, even those who came from out of town to see it before it got moved indoors (for the first time since Reagan's second inauguration forty years earlier).

I remember the first time I met Donald Trump -- well, sort of.

Along the stretch of Pennsylvania Avenue, in Washington DC, is the Old Post Office and Clock Tower. Construction began in 1892, and was completed in 1899, and was the main post office in the Nation's capital until 1914. In recent years, after being saved from near destruction, the government made numerous attempts to find a sustaining purpose for the building. None seemed to work.

Then in 2013, Donald Trump wanted a hotel in the heart of the city. And he wanted it to make one out of that historic building.

But first, he had to go through a government agency known as the General Services Administration (GSA), which is the building manager, purchasing agent, and IT acquisition manager of the Federal government. It is also where I worked for more than forty years before my retirement in July of 2022.

No, I've never mentioned before, in public social media, where I worked in the federal government. Yes, because I'm retired, it can now be told.

I was with the communications staff of GSA. By the early 2010s, I had already transitioned from graphic design and publishing to video production and photography. The leasing of the historic building to "DJT Holdings LLC" was to be highlighted by a grand ceremony involving the turning over of the keys. After spending over an hour convincing a bunch of rent-a-cops that we belonged there, we started setting up cameras and microphones and the whole nine yards. It was a hot summer day, which didn't make it any easier.

As preparations began, there he was along the mezzanine, speaking with three of the men for whom I worked, all of whom stood there, as mesmerized as I might have been. There I saw a man, the author of "The Art of the Deal" and as big as life, a man sure of his destiny in life, a destiny that called to him to grab unto himself that which was his. I never was impressed with his television appearances on "The Apprentice" or anywhere else, but seeing him there was enough to convince me, that yes, he was larger than life.

I operated the camera in front of the podium. I also did the editing of the video you see here, and worked with Judy, who did the voiceover, and with whom I got it uploaded to the server just before the deadline.

Fast forward to 2016.

The race was between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. I didn't care for either of them. A wise priest told me that "the lesser of two evils is still an evil." And after years of choosing between an unsuitable candidate, and an uninspiring candidate, I was considering staying away from the polls that year, abstaining from the first presidential election since I was eligible to vote in one in 1976.

But fate intervened, and I found myself five hundred miles west of my precinct on Election Day, to bury my mother, who had passed into eternity only two days before.

It so happens that the GSA, however obscure to those not on the federal payroll, has a little-known but very critical role during the change of the executive office of the President. After an election, the Administrator of General Services has the power to determine, as a matter of statutory law, and in advance of formal determination by the Electoral College, the presumptive victor of the presidential election, followed by the handing over of any funds or facilities necessary for the transition to complete its ... well, transitioning.

It is rarely a controversial matter, except maybe once.

I was a graphic designer (or "Visual Information Specialist GS-1084") for most of my career, beginning in December of 1980. After completing diploma studies for Web Design and Interactive Media at the Art Institute of Washington from 2004 to 2009, I learned that my agency did not require an additional web designer after all (so I didn't complain that they paid for most of it). Meanwhile, I learned that animation software (Adobe After Effects) was very similar to video editing software (Final Cut Pro, later Adobe Premiere Pro). I had also studied photography in college, so that was my way into a new field. Eventually, I was transferred to Video Production (as an "Audiovisual Production Specialist GS-1071").

My director assigned me to be vetted by the US Secret Service, and I had access to the secured wing of our building that was used by the Transition. I was told to wear a suit every day (which I would have done anyway). I had to have special identification card to wear, opposite the agency credentials, to wear within the secure area, and to hide the minute we left said area, so as to avoid surprise inquiries from the press (and until then, admonished only to say "no comment").

One of my first assignments was to photograph the provisional office spaces for the President-Elect, the Vice President-Elect, and the "First Spouse" and "Second Spouse." Yes, they each got their own, whether they used them or not. During this time, I was given my own personal Secret Service agent. His name was Steve, he wore tactical gear, and he carried a really big gun.

The Vice President-elect and his wife eventually used their offices. The other couple, not so much.

The President-elect must appoint several thousand men and women to various policy positions throughout the executive branch. The key apppintees -- those who would head the various cabinet departments and agencies -- must be approved by the Congress. Their previous official portraits might contain backdrops that render them unsuitable, so they must have new ones, with only the American flag in the background. That's where my director and I came in.

And so, I got to meet some of the key appointments, at times even being practically alone in the room with them.

Among the first was South Carolina Governor Nimarata Nikki Randhawa Haley, aka Nikki Haley, as Ambassador-designate to the United Nations. She was the most distant of all of them -- my director took care of her, while I adjusted the lighting -- and she had the largest entourage of all of them, at least three staff members, and two plainclothes South Carolina state troopers. The police guys were pretty cool, the others eager to please en route to the UN. But to her credit, shw was also the most photogenic -- my director said she practically took her own photo.

I did the official photos of so many of them, but a few out of all of them were memorable.

There was General John Francis Kelly, USMC, as Secretary-designate of Homeland Security (later White House Chief of Staff). He noticed the Eagle Scout insignia on my suit lapel -- yes, I made a point of wearing that one -- which he was quick to notice. He pointed to it and told me "that's a really big deal." After the session was done, he made his selection, and said it again: "That's a really big deal."

I didn't know what he meant at the time, but it occurred to me later. In some branches of the Armed Services, Eagle Scouts get a bump in rank by the time they complete basic training. And why? Because they know stuff before they even get off the bus; how to pack gear, how to hike, how to set up camp, how to track, how to cook meals in the field, how to shoot guns, how to treat basic wounds, how to carry the wounded, how to jump in water over one's head to save someone else's life, all the while risking one's life, and so on.

Yeah, that is "a really big deal." I thanked him for that.

Then there was Rex Tillerson, Secretary-designate of State, and former President of the Boy Scouts of America (2010-2012). I would seldom speak to the subjects unless spoken to. In this case, when it was over, I leaned in and said: "From one Eagle to another, good luck, sir." He responded with that characteristic Texas drawl. "Yeah, it sure meant a lot to me back then."

Most of the appointees were just here for the day, and would be shuffled from one meeting to another, and I was lucky to get five or ten minutes with them, not a lot of time for do-overs. I didn't need do-overs. But there was one notable exception.

No, not for do-overs. Bear with me.

James Richard Perry was the immediate past Governor of Texas, and Secretary-designate of Energy. He noticed my lapel pin immediately, came up and shook my hand, and identified himself as a brother Eagle. We spent at least five or ten minutes just comparing notes, how his Class of 1965 was the last class of Eagles without the mandatory service requirement, how mine as one of the Class of 1971 would never pass muster today, that the National Council of BSA realized they couldn't buy the kind of publicity these service projects gave them. He was sincerely fascinated by this.

After the session was over, he wanted to see my camera. I thought he wanted to pick his choice. No, he wanted to check out that big 200x piece of glass I had for a lens. It seems that photography is another of his hobbies. So we talked about that too. I don't know how he finds the time.

When was leaving the secure area for my office, I saw him rush past members of the press waiting by his car without comment. To think that he was unable to spend a few minutes with them, in favor of talking to a nobody like me.

What a stand-up guy!

It all came to an end on the 19th of January, when my final assignment was as photographer for the Vice President-elect's final press conference before his inauguration. In the months and years that followed, I heard from other Trump appointees, of how my reputation for my work was to my credit, and that of my agency. That stayed with me, and kept me going, all for a career change in mid-life that I entered "through the back door," learning along the way, and learning from some of the best and most patient men and women on the federal payroll.

I also remember what Tucker Carlson once said about Trump in his book Ship of Fools: How a Selfish Ruling Class Is Bringing America to the Brink of Revolution

Trump’s election wasn’t about Trump. It was a throbbing middle finger in the face of America’s ruling class. It was a gesture of contempt, a howl of rage, the end result of decades of selfish and unwise decisions made by selfish and unwise leaders. Happy countries don’t elect Donald Trump president. Desperate ones do.

In retrospect, the lesson seemed obvious: Ignore voters for long enough and you get Donald Trump.

I retired at the end of July of 2022, but of all the experiences I ever had, all my accomplishments, all my memories, the aforementioned remains to this day on the short list of the most memorable. My only regret is that my mother and father were not alive to hear me tell of it. After all, I worked alongside men who would go on to make history. Not too shabby, don't you think?

Or don't you?

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