Who is currently in charge in the US? Jill Biden? Kamala Harris? President-on-paper Joe Biden? Or is it in fact president-elect Donald Trump? Many signs point to the latter, not least the undeniable reality that the centre of American political power has already shifted about 1,000 miles to the south: from the grand neoclassical designs of the White House and the Capitol to the gilded-age-meets-Louis-XIV shrine of Mar-a-Lago.
When Marjorie Merriweather Post — the breakfast cereals heiress who commissioned the Florida resort a century ago — left Mar-a-Lago to the federal government upon her death in 1973, the then administration decided it wasn’t worth the hassle or the expense. The estate was given back to the Post Foundation, which sold it to Trump in 1985. He converted it into a private members’ club in 1994. But Post’s idea that it should become a “Winter White House” was finally made a reality during the 45th president’s first term in office. And despite the fact he is not yet the 47th, the description now seems more fitting than ever.
In recent weeks, a constant flow of billionaires, politicians and other forms of power broker and sycophant has passed through the Palm Beach palace. Elon Musk seems to have decamped there semi-permanently. Techno-romantic venture capitalist Marc Andreessen says he is — how altruistic — spending half his time in the club to “help out”. The Reform UK party’s leader Nigel Farage and treasurer Nick Candy have been pictured there, grinning alongside Musk.