Updated — see below
Barack got it but The Donald won’t.
When Barack Hussein Obama was sworn in as the nation’s 44th president, the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority (WMATA) honored him by putting his smiling face on farecards. This happened both in 2009 and 2013.
But when Donald John Trump is sworn in as the 45th president of the United States next month he will receive no such honor.
That’s because WMATA claims Trump didn’t give the body permission to use his likeness.
Yeah, I don’t believe it either.
This is likely the beginning of what promises to be a long train* of indignities and slights to be heaped on Trump by the Washington establishment.
*yes, a pun
Updated evening of Dec. 22: Well, it looks like I was on to something. Now WMATA suddenly performs an about-face, announcing that President-elect Trump’s face will appear on sleeves for the inauguration weekend farecards. WTOP reports:
A day after Metro started selling inauguration-themed SmarTrip cards that don’t feature President-elect Donald Trump, the transit agency confirmed it’s designing special sleeves for the fare cards.
The Presidential Inaugural Committee announced Thursday it’s “working closely” with Metro to design a sleeve for the inauguration-edition SmarTrip cards similar to sleeves that were produced for Pope Francis’ September 2015 visit to D.C., according to a tweet from the committee’s communications director, Boris Epshteyn.
We’re working closely w/ @WMATA to design a sleeve for @TrumpInaugural SmartTrip cards, similar to what was done for @Pontifex visit to DC!
— Boris Epshteyn (@BorisEP) December 22, 2016