For years, the Democrats have painted Donald Trump and his version of the Republican Party as an existential threat to democracy. Leaning into this characterization, President Joe Biden’s farewell address warned of an oligarchy taking over the country — a claim that is as true in the moment he said it as it was all those years before, when he didn’t.

On Monday, Biden will welcome Trump to the White House as the duly elected president. On one level, this ceremony is simply the routine pageantry of governance, maintaining the decorum and structure expected of institutional continuity. However, given the Democrats’ often apocalyptic framing of Trump and company, this passing of the torch highlights the disconnect between aesthetic rituals and the increasingly messy contradictions of contemporary politics. These standardized ceremonies, meant to signify unity and stability, are more vulnerable than normal to the charge of hypocrisy and artifice.