Biden says he was pleased to learn Trump will skip his inauguration

President-elect Joe Biden said he was pleased when Donald Trump announced he will not attend his swearing-in ceremony later this month following the president’s incitement of the Capitol riot carried out by his loyalists.

Mr Biden called the outgoing chief executive’s decision "one of the few things he and I have ever agreed on.

It's a good thing — him not showing up,” Mr Biden said Friday.

He called for a “full-blown investigation” into the security failure at the Capitol and for the “thugs” and “domestic terrorists’ who carried it out to be prosecuted aggressively.

Mr Biden, who served in the Senate for 36 years, criticized the president for “encouraging a mob.” Some Democrats and legal experts have called for Mr Trump to face legal charges for his role in whipping the crowd into a frenzy at a rally before they walked across town and forced their way into the Capitol building.

Asked about Vice President Mike Pence attending, Mr Biden said: “He’s welcome.”

“If the Vice President is welcome to come, we’d be honored to have him there,” he said.

If Mr Pence comes, it will show that, even despite Mr Trump’s antics, there is an element of the outgoing administration that believes in the peaceful transfer of power.