Commentary: Four Seasons Total Landscaping felt like a joke. In reality, it was a warning
Until the morning of Nov. 7, 2020, Four Seasons Total Landscaping was just another small business off Interstate 95 in the far northeastern reaches of Philadelphia. If not for the incompetence of then-President Trump’s campaign staff, it would have remained as anonymous as the neighboring auto body shops and check-cashing stores.
But the business earned an unlikely place in the history books when Trump’s lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, staged a bizarre press conference on the property — just as TV networks began to call the election for Joe Biden. Standing in front of a green cinder block garage papered in Trump-Pence signs, a bright yellow garden hose within arm’s reach, the once-revered mayor of New York announced plans to file lawsuits in multiple states and painted Philadelphia, a Democratic stronghold in a pivotal swing state, as a den of corruption where the election was being stolen from Trump in broad daylight.
He claimed, among other things, that long-dead people, like the boxing great Joe Frazier — who died in 2011— continued to vote in the city. In reality, the pandemic had led to a surge in voting by mail, particularly by Democrats. So as millions of those ballots were methodically tallied, what had appeared to be a lead for Trump steadily eroded. Roughly 30 minutes into his rambling, Giuliani was informed that the race had been called for Biden.
Times staffers look back on election week 2020, from the rise of the ‘chartthrobs’ to the Four Seasons Total Landscaping debacle, to understand what to expect this time around.
Everything about the event was hard to believe — most especially the location. Why had the Trump campaign chosen a dusty industrial lot in a grimy corner of Philly for this grave announcement? Surely, this was supposed to take place at the Four Seasons? As in, the hotel?
The evidence pointed to some miscommunication in the campaign. Earlier that morning, Trump had tweeted, “Lawyers Press Conference at Four Seasons, Philadelphia. 11 AM,†seemingly referring to the luxury accommodation in Center City. But he quickly deleted the message, and posted a revised tweet at 9:45 am: “Big press conference today in Philadelphia at Four Seasons Total Landscaping — 11:30am!†The confusion triggered a flurry of jokes on social media, and even prompted the Four Seasons Hotel to issue a tweet: “To clarify, President Trump’s press conference will NOT be held at Four Seasons Hotel Philadelphia. It will be held at Four Seasons Total Landscaping — no relation with the hotel.â€
To this day, the question of how the press conference wound up where it did, a stone’s throw from Fantasy Island Adult Bookstore and the Delaware Valley Crematorium, remains one of the great mysteries of American history, along with the whereabouts of Jimmy Hoffa. (Might I suggest searching northeast Philly, just off I-95?) Many assumed the booking was a mistake made by a frazzled advance staffer who called the wrong Four Seasons. But according to reports at the time, the campaign intentionally booked Four Seasons Total Landscaping because of its proximity to I-95. Trump heard the words “Four Seasons†and assumed it was the hotel — which, to be fair, was a logical conclusion.
Over the coming days, the owners of Four Seasons Total Landscaping did their patriotic duty and cashed in on their temporary notoriety, selling souvenirs to commemorate the fiasco; to Trump’s detractors, the debacle epitomized the clownish incompetence that had defined his presidency.
With a middle-of-the-night press conference from the East Room of the White House, Donald Trump kicked off his effort to steal the 2020 election. It could happen again.
With time though, the event has grown less funny. As a viral phenomenon, it has been eclipsed by another moment from that Saturday — the phone call in which Vice President Kamala Harris, wearing workout gear, sunglasses and a messy ponytail, proclaimed “We did it, Joe!,†her voice straining with excitement and exhaustion, after the election was called for Biden. But it’s the delusion and mendacity on display at Giuliani’s press conference that have more powerfully shaped American political culture. The calls to “stop the count!†ultimately led to the insurrection at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, and the doubts Trump planted in the minds of his followers have since hardened into belief: Nearly 70% of Republicans believe that Biden’s 2020 win was illegitimate.
In retrospect, that Saturday was when the timelines of the two Americas truly began to diverge. The video, filmed by Harris’ husband, Doug Emhoff, was striking because of its normalcy. Here was a middle-aged woman, fresh off a run, casually clutching a pair of earphones in her hand while she placed an important work call. It inspired a slew of TikTok parodies, souvenir mugs and jokey posts commemorating accomplishments far less impressive than winning the White House. By contrast, the Four Seasons Total Landscaping press conference felt like a portal to a bizarro dimension where Joe Frazier was still alive and Trump had won the election.
Sometime this week — one hopes — we will know which side can proclaim victory in 2024. Barring another mishap by the Trump campaign, Four Seasons Total Landscaping is unlikely to play a pivotal role. But we are no doubt still living through the fever dream it unleashed.
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