Contact Jordan LaPier Director (202) 495-3320 jlapier@ourpublicservice.org Here’s How a Transition Is Supposed to Work November 12, 2020 For only the second time in history, the head of the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) has refused to formally kick-start the presidential transition. What’s needed is a letter of ascertainment, a hitherto little-known piece of Washington bureaucracy that officially gets the transition process underway.