Donald Trump doesn’t take office until January 20th, but one might think his second term has already begun. Over since the election victory Kamala Harris Last month, Trump dominated the news cycles, sparred with foreign leaders and even began pushing parts of his agenda — all without much resistance from the current administration.

Over the weekend, as Notre Dame reopened after the fire that ravaged it in 2019, the president-elect — but not the sitting president — Joe Biden– was present in Paris and met with the French President Emmanuel Macron and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskywith whom he discussed the “situation on the battlefield” in the fight against Russia. “We all want to end this war as quickly and fairly as possible,” Zelensky said in a statement about the “productive meeting” with Trump.

Of course, it is not uncommon for new presidents to have limited contacts with foreign leaders. However, this was not the relationship building of a typical transition; Trump has attempted to promote policy positions that differ from those of the current administration. After meeting with Zelensky, Trump called for an “immediate ceasefire” between Ukraine and Russia – a day after the Biden White House announced $1 billion in new military aid to Kiev. And after threatening massive tariffs against Canada and Mexico — America’s two largest trading partners — a few weeks earlier, he hosted Justin Trudeau at Mar-a-Lago for unofficial diplomacy and made a phone call Claudia Sheinbaum across the border.

Biden, meanwhile, has been holding back since his party’s defeat last month, leaving the spotlight, the bully pulpit and the most visible parts of the presidency to his successor – frustrating some Democrats who want him to use his final weeks in office to make a stronger case for the… To stand up for values ​​threatened by Trump.

“This is one of the lamest ducks we’ve seen in a Democratic administration,” he said Usamah Adrabi the progressive group Justice Democrats summed it up Wall Street Journal. “We should be less hindered and more encouraged,” the Democratic governor of Washington added Jay Inslee.

Certainly, even before Trump’s second term, Biden had already struggled to assert himself and shape the national discussion. The Republican’s victory – which comes with a triangle of government – has only reinforced Biden’s impending irrelevance. Still, it is remarkable how much the president has disappeared from the public eye as a man he rightly identified as a threat to democracy prepares to take power.

Biden did not hold a press conference about the election results Barack Obama After Trump’s victory in 2016, he also didn’t assert his authority the way Obama did: “There’s one president at a time,” Obama said at the time. Biden has said little about Trump’s nominees, some of whom are so dangerous and unqualified that even some Republicans have expressed concerns. And while he has tried to “prove Trump” some of his accomplishments, the most recent action he has taken since the Nov. 5 election appears to be pardoning his son. Hunter Biden— an about-face he justified by repeating Trump’s own self-serving claims about political bias in the Justice Department.

There’s a sense that Biden is limping toward the finish line, leaving a leadership void that his successor is only too happy to fill: “The Biden administration is definitely frustrated,” a House Democrat told Axios. “In some ways, what’s most frustrating is that some of us really love Joe Biden,” the representative added. “The feeling is: Why do you have to go out like that?’”