Trump signals he is prepared to leave White House when Biden confirmed

US President Donald Trump has said he will leave the White House if the Electoral College formalises Joe Biden’s victory at the polls.

But he insisted such a decision would be a “mistake” as he spent his Thanksgiving renewing baseless claims that “massive fraud” and crooked officials in battleground states caused his election defeat.

The fact that a sitting American President even had to address whether or not he would leave office after losing re-election underscores the extent to which Mr Trump has smashed one convention after another over the last three weeks.

While there is no evidence of the kind of widespread fraud Mr Trump has been alleging, he and his legal team have nonetheless been working to cast doubt on the integrity of the election and trying to overturn voters’ will in an unprecedented breach of norms. Mr Biden won by wide margins in both the Electoral College and popular vote,.

Asked whether he would vacate the building and allow a peaceful transition of power in January, Mr Trump said: “I will. But you know that. This has a long way to go.”

Mr Trump’s administration has already given the green light for a formal transition to get under way, but he took issue with Mr Biden moving forward. But he has made it clear he will likely never formally concede, even if he said he would leave the White House.

“It’s gonna be a very hard thing to concede. Because we know there was massive fraud,” he said, noting that, “time isn’t on our side”.

Asked whether he would attend Mr Biden’s inauguration, Mr Trump said he knew the answer but did not want to share it yet.