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With temperatures reaching a high of 24 degrees in Washington, D.C., the event was moved into the Capitol Rotunda, with a reduced audience as Trump’s political comeback was made official.
By Kevin Dolak
At noon local time on Monday, Donald Trump placed a hand on the Bible and took the oath of office, promising to protect the United States as he stepped back into the U.S. presidency from inside the Capitol Rotunda.
“The golden age of America begins right now. From this day forward our country will flourish and be respected again all over the world,” Trump said as he began his inaugural address.
On Monday, among the traditional inauguration attendees — the president-elect and vice president-elect’s families, former presidents and first ladies, dignitaries, cabinet members and nominees, the Joint Chiefs of Staff and others — were familiar faces from the world of Big Tech. Tesla CEO Elon Musk, who cozied up to Trump during his campaign and landed a cabinet position, was at the Rotunda. Others out of the Valley included Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg, Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew, Google’s Sundar Pichai and OpenAI’s Sam Altman.
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During his address, Trump brought up the ongoing state of emergency in Los Angeles and promised to create change to prevent and combat such emergencies like the ongoing wildfires from taking place. He had previously said that he would “probably” visit L.A. soon to survey the damage caused by the massive fires over the past two weeks.
“Our country can no longer deliver basic services in times of emergency … recently [in] Los Angeles, where we are watching fires still tragically burning from weeks ago without even a token of defense, raging through the houses and communities, even affecting some of the wealthiest and most powerful individuals in our country, some of whom are sitting here right now,” Trump said. “They don’t have a home any longer. That’s interesting. We can’t let this happen. Everyone is unable to do anything about it. That’s going to change.”
Mention was made of several of his campaign promises during his address, including the immediate implementation of a hardline immigration policy, halting efforts to ”socially engineer race and gender into every aspect of public and private life” in favor of a “colorblind and merit-based United States,” and changing the name of the Gulf of Mexico to Gulf of America (Hillary Clinton was seen laughing out loud from the audience at this moment).
Trump also promised to sign an executive order to “immediately stop all government censorship and bring back free speech to America.” Throughout his first presidency and the four years between terms, Trump has consistently griped about social media — particularly after being banned from both Facebook and Twitter in the wake of the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol by his supporters. He also has a long, combative history with the media that escalated over the past four years as he has continuously falsely claimed that the 2020 election was rigged. Speculation has been high around how the Fourth Estate will handle Trump’s second term, particularly after the chilling effect that came after ABC News settled a defamation lawsuit he filed against the network.
Trump’s inauguration came on a frigid day in Washington, D.C., with a high of 24 degrees and wind gusts of 31 miles per hour, according to the National Weather Service. Ronald Reagan’s second inauguration in 1985 was the only previous swearing-in to be moved from the West Front of the Rotunda, a fact noted by Trump in his Friday announcement about the move.
The move of the event inside the Capitol has significantly cut down the number of inauguration attendees — by more than half, according to NPR, which reports that the 1600-capacity West Front platform has now been reduced to the roughly 750-capacity Rotunda. Around 250,000 people who ticketed for the outdoor inauguration were not able to witness Trump’s second swearing.
Trump was sworn in by sworn in by Chief Justice John Roberts. Vice President-elect J.D. Vance was sworn in before Trump by Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh to do the honors; incidentally, Vance’s wife, Usha Vance, clerked for Kavanaugh at the U.S. Court of Appeals’ D.C. Circuit.
On Monday morning, New York Mayor Eric Adams received a last-minute invitation to the inauguration and his office said he plans to attend. Adams, who in September pleaded not guilty after he was indicted on bribery and campaign finance-related charges, lunched with Trump on Friday. The Trump team also announced that Han Zheng, the vice president of China, will attend.
Here is how to watch the inauguration, coverage of which began 8:30 a.m. PT/11:30 a.m. ET.
Jan. 20, 10:30 a.m. This story was updated at the conclusion of Trump’s official address.
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