The first thing you notice when approaching the Southern Boulevard Bridge is the tent set-up alongside the right lane of the multi-lane thoroughfare that connects West Palm Beach, Florida with the tony enclave of Palm Beach.
The white canopy isn’t there to provide shelter to a camper — or any human at all. It’s there to ensure the comfort of one of the most important members of the protective team now responsible for securing the next President of the United States: a dog.
This canine hero, whose handler declined to name citing security concerns, is part of a series of checkpoints that once again dot the landscape near the Mar-a-Lago, the nearly 100-year-old mansion-turned-private club where Donald Trump has maintained as his primary residence since leaving the White House nearly four years ago.
Weeks ago, following the second of two assassination attempts against the then-former president, the Secret Service stepped up the level of protection afforded to Trump, making it far beyond what would be done for a candidate or a former president. The result has been a slow ratcheting-up of the virtual fortress surrounding Trump’s famed estate, which was once willed to the US government by cereal heiress Marjorie Merriweather Post in hopes that it would become a permanent “Winter White House.”
The government never put her generous gift to that use and later sold the property — to Trump — rather than pay the upkeep for the historic building and the contents within. Yet Post’s dream became reality in 2017, when Trump was sworn in as president and insisted on making nearly weekly trips to the club for rest and recreation.
Now, after four years as the home of what was in effect a Republican government-in-exile during the Biden administration, Mar-a-Lago is once again the center of the universe. It’s where Trump is basing his transition operation as he prepares to return to the Oval Office with a mandate conferred on him by his winning the popular vote for the first time.
On the approach to the property’s entrance, it’s clear that something has changed from the relatively sleepy days of the Biden administration. At the foot of the bridge, along the banks of the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway, similar tents to the one used to cool the Secret Service’s bomb-sniffing dog are sheltering television camera positions from which correspondents can broadcast within sight of the mansion.
The mansion itself can be spotted thanks to the massive flagpole Trump first erected over the objections of the Palm Beach municipal government — and the Secret Service’s portable watchtowers that dot the property. And in the water nearby, an armed Coast Guard patrol boat keeps watch to prevent aquatic attacks.
On the roadside, multiple Trump flags are being waved by supporters. One person walks along the waterfront path with a gigantic flag blowing in the wind. It bears a message that appears to have been custom-made for the occasion: “Trump Won.”
The carnival-like scene near Trump’s home is an echo of what could be seen outside the West Palm Beach convention center the previous night. Inside, Trump’s most loyal supporters, fans, and campaign aides were dressed to the nines as they watched the election returns coming in while Trump himself — and his closest inner circle — did the same at Mar-a-Lago.
Outside the convention center, the view was a mix of a street festival and the cold open for a Law and Order episode, with the lights from a mass of police cars flashing and reflecting off a fleet of dump trucks and other heavy vehicles that were being used to block the way to the convention hall.
Along the road, the convention center property had been ringed by the kind of riot-proof fencing that became ubiquitous in Washington just four years ago after Trump fomented a riot after losing the last presidential election.
Just past 1:00 am on Wednesday, the 100 or so Trump fans who’d flocked to the site were mounting an impromptu vigil, waiting for any sign that Trump’s motorcade would soon cross the nearby bridge into West Palm Beach. They were so intent on catching a glimpse of Trump making his entrance that they missed a bonafide MAGA celebrity in their midst.
Crossing the street from a nearby parking facility was Nigel Farage, the recently elected Member of Parliament for Clacton and the leader of the Reform UK Party. Thousands of miles from Westminster, Farage was in Florida to celebrate the return of his friend to the highest office in America.
Though he passed by the crowd of Trump supporters unnoticed, The Independent spotted him and quickly approached him to ask for his thoughts on the night’s events.
“I’m very happy — you guys got it all wrong again,” he said.
Trump’s victory means that Palm Beach and the surrounding area will now be playing host to the same traveling roadshow that followed Trump during his first term. Not only will the streets and hotels be constantly filled with the flag-waving fans, supporters, courtiers and sycophants that have surrounded him during his years in the wilderness, but he will now be accompanied by the even larger coterie aides, security personnel and journalists who follow any sitting president of the United States everywhere he goes.
At the City Diner, a quintessentially American watering hole that is a roughly ten-minute drive from the president-elect’s beach club, patrons appeared enthused by the imminent return of presidential glitz and glamor to their area. But one man, who declined to provide a name, did lament the frequent traffic snarls that resulted whenever then-president Trump and his motorcade needed to go anywhere during his first term in office, said he wasn’t looking forward to the return of the “Trump circus.”
On the whole, however, he told The Independent he thinks Trump’s return to office will be a net positive for the country.
“It may not be great for Palm Beach, but it’s great for America,” he said.
