Washington: US First Lady Melania Trump has joined other members of her husband Donald Trump's inner circle asking him to accept his loss and concede defeat to President-elect Joe Biden, informed a source familiar with the conversations.
The source said that although Melania has not publicly commented on the election, she has privately weighed in with her opinion, reported CNN.
"She has offered it, as she often does," said the source.
Melania had earlier campaigned for her husband's re-election campaign last month. Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump's son-in-law and his senior adviser, had earlier approached the President about conceding the election, two sources told CNN.
Jared Kushner, Donald Trump's son-in-law and senior adviser, has approached a defiant president about conceding the closely-fought election to his Democratic rival Joe Biden.
The move comes following Trump's assertion in a statement from his campaign, after major US media outlets projected that president-elect Biden will become the 46th president of the United States, that "Biden is rushing to falsely pose as the winner and that the race is far from over".
Joe Biden-Kamala Harris deputy campaign manager Kate Bedingfield said that there has been no communication between Biden and Trump, or between any representatives from either campaign, since the race was called on Saturday after the 77-year-old former US vice president crossed the 270 electoral college votes required to win the race for the White House.
Kushner has approached the president about conceding the election, CNN quoted two unidentified sources as saying. Kushner has told others that he has urged the president to accept the outcome of the race even if Trump won't come to terms with how it was reached, the Associated Press also reported on Sunday.
Two sources told Fox News that Trump would concede and execute a peaceful transfer of power if his campaign's legal challenges fall short of changing the projected outcome. A lack of concession by Trump would not prevent Biden from assuming the presidency on January 20, 2021. "Donald Trump does not get to decide the winner of elections," Symone Sanders, a Biden campaign senior adviser, told reporters in Wilmington, Delaware, on Saturday. "The people decide, voters in the country decide, as we have long said, and voters have made their choice very clear," Voice of America quoted Sanders as saying.
But Trump appeared to be defiant, even after all major US media outlets projected Biden as the winner. "I will not rest until the American People have the honest vote count they deserve and that Democracy demands," Trump said in the statement, which states that the campaign's legal battle will begin on Monday. The Trump campaign has filed suits in several battleground states where Biden led by a razor-thin margin, including Nevada, Pennsylvania, and Georgia.
Trump, 74, who was at his golf course in Sterling, Virginia, on Saturday when the race was called, has not denied the outcome of the election, privately at least, CNN, quoted sources as saying.
But Trump was continuing to push his attorneys to pursue legal challenges that would delay formal certification of the results of the 2020 presidential polls. White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, who recently tested positive for coronavirus, discussed next steps with the legal team on Saturday, CNN added.
