WASHINGTON (AP) – Paul Chavez had no idea where a sculpture of his father, Latin American civil rights and labor leader Cesar Chavez, would end up in the White House.
This week he agreed to lend the bronze bust to President Joe Biden and hurried to wrap it up and ship it across the country from California. It was an absolute surprise on Wednesday when he saw Biden at his desk in the oval office, with the bust of the late César Chávez just behind the president.
“We keep smiling cheek to cheek,” Paul Chavez said in an interview Thursday.
Biden insisted on issues of unity and the inclusion and defense of racial justice during the campaign, and Chávez said Biden seemed to be trying to convey this through a series of rapid decorative changes he has made in the most powerful office in the world.
Chávez said the prominent placement of his father’s likeness in the White House sends the message that it is a “new day” after Donald Trump’s tenure and the anti-immigrant policies that he and his advisers pushed. Chávez, who is chairman and chairman of the board of directors of the foundation named by his father, predicted that “the contributions of working people, immigrants, Latinos … to the new administration will be taken into account.”
Whenever Biden is seen on his desk, Chávez, an advocate for agricultural workers, will also be there.
Biden revealed his retouching in the Oval Office on Wednesday as he signed a series of executive orders and other actions in his early hours as the nation’s 46th president.
The most striking change visually is Biden’s election of a deep blue carpet, with the presidential stamp in the center, which was last used by President Bill Clinton, to replace a light-colored carpet set by Trump. Biden also uses Clinton’s gold curtains.
Busts of civil rights activist Martin Luther King Jr. are also shown. and Rosa Parks, along with a sculpture by President Harry Truman. Biden withdrew a bust of Winston Churchill, the former British Prime Minister.
On the wall, in front of Biden’s desk, is a collage portrait of predecessors George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Franklin D. Roosevelt, along with Alexander Hamilton, the founding father and former secretary of the treasury.
The portrait of President Andrew Jackson, a Trump favorite who signed the Indian Withdrawal Act that forced tens of thousands of Native Americans to leave their homeland, is no longer on display.
Biden maintains the Resolute board, so named because it was built of oak from the British Arctic exploration ship HMS Resolute. But he got rid of the red button Trump had on his desk and would press for a butler to bring him a Diet Coke, his favorite drink.
All presidents adjust the oval office decoration to the beginning of their terms to reflect their personal tastes or to telegraph broader messages to the public.
The White House maintains a large collection of furniture, paintings and other artifacts to choose from. Presidents are also allowed to borrow items from the Smithsonian Museum and others. The White House commissioner oversees everything and the transformation takes place hours after the outgoing president leaves the mansion and before the new president arrives.
Biden also replaced a row of military service flags that Trump used to decorate the office with a single American flag and a flag with the presidential stamp, both located behind his desk.
He also chose a dark, padded brown leather chair instead of holding the reddish brown desk chair that Trump wore.