THE ESSEX FILES: The Credit Grab That Says It All

In the era of his post-presidency, Joe Biden couldn't resist one last pat on the back—not for his own record, but for the successes of the man who routed his successor at the polls. With a Gaza ceasefire freshly inked under Donald Trump's watchful eye, Biden and Antony Blinken, who wrote a thread on X about the ceasefire, have taken to the podiums, insisting their "groundwork" deserves a share of the applause. It's a claim as predictable as it is revealing: In Washington, even defeat demands a footnote in victory.

(1/12) In Gaza today, the guns are largely silent. If all goes as planned, the remaining Israeli hostages will return home. Palestinians will get the relief they desperately need and deserve. Nothing can erase the pain and loss of the past two years. But there is real hope of…
— Antony Blinken (@ABlinken) October 11, 2025

Yet Joe Biden himself released a statement commending President Trump and his team for their work to get a "renewed ceasefire deal over the finish line."

Biden, Harris Statements on the Gaza Peace Deal Leave Out Some Inconvenient Facts

Also:

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Bill Clinton both publicly commended President Trump and his administration for their role in brokering the deal, urging both nonpartisan and international support for the process.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer released a statement celebrating the return of the remaining living Israeli hostages and commending President Trump and his administration.
Senator John Fetterman was one of the first members of Congress to congratulate the President on the "historic peace plan."

🇺🇸🇮🇱 Benjamin Netanyahu praises President Trump:

"I've seen a lot of American presidents. I've never seen anyone move the world so quickly, so decisively, so resolutely as our friend, President Donald J. Trump."

He is 100% correct.pic.twitter.com/Hodhx7ncmA
— Vivid.🇮🇱 (@VividProwess) October 14, 2025

Let's be clear: The deal that silenced the rockets last week, freeing 20 hostages plus getting the dead hostages out so they can receive a proper burial, opening aid routes, and pulling back forces from Gaza's ruins—didn't sprout from the Biden administration's quiet diplomacy. It emerged from Trump's unyielding pressure, the kind that treats allies as partners and adversaries as problems to solve, not excuses to dither. Netanyahu, long chafed by the Biden administration's hand-wringing over settlements and aid packages, found in Trump's team a clarity absent for years, led by Marco Rubio and helped by Jared Kushner. Qatar's backchannels, Israel's resolve, and yes, the sheer momentum of an America First mandate did the heavy lifting. Biden's team?

PEACE: Disgraced Former Secretary of State Antony Blinken is desperately trying to get the drive-by media to give him credit for Trump’s success in the Middle East. Pathetic on so many levels. pic.twitter.com/S2YGYWCo0D
— @amuse (@amuse) October 13, 2025

They were the dark matches that no one cared about before the real show begins. Blinken's line about setting the table rings especially hollow. Recall the State Department's fumbling: billions in aid to a war zone with strings so loose they might as well have been kites, vetoes at the UN that pleased no one, and a ceasefire push in 2024 that collapsed under its own vagueness. This was only "groundwork" in the way a leaky foundation precedes a collapse.

Biden's brick-by-brick metaphor fares no better—those bricks were mostly apologies and equivocation, eroding U.S. leverage with every concession. What galls isn't the revisionism alone, though it's rich coming from an administration that once branded Trump's style as reckless. It's the timing, the pettiness of it. With midterms looming and Democrats nursing wounds from last November, this is less about foreign policy than domestic spin: a bid to recast failure as prelude, isolation as investment.

Trump, for his part, has stayed above the fray, letting results speak. His transition aides brushed it off as "lame-duck noise," a restraint that underscores the difference between showmanship and statesmanship. In the end, credit isn't a participation trophy. It's earned in the room, under the lights, when the stakes are lives and legacies.

Biden and Blinken can claim the prep work all they like, but the feast belongs to the host who delivered. True leadership doesn't borrow glory—it forges it. And on that score, the contrast couldn't be starker.

Editor's Note: Donald Trump is America's Peace Time President. Support and follow RedState’s latest reporting on the president's historic trip to the Middle East.

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