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What we saw at the inauguration

Biden leaves Washington amid a flurry of pardons

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What we saw at the inauguration

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Donald J. Trump is once again the president of the United States.

If you’re reading this newsletter, you probably watched the speech and the proceedings in the Capitol Rotunda. We’re hoping to bring you a little bit behind the scenes of what was going on.

Seating at the inauguration was extraordinarily limited after the event was moved from the West Front of the Capitol to the Rotunda. Governors and other dignitaries — Texas GOP Gov. Greg Abbott, Florida GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis and Georgia GOP Gov. Brian Kemp — were seated in an overflow room in the Capitol Visitor Center’s Emancipation Hall. Meanwhile, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Google CEO Sundar Pichai, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Charlie Kirk, Tucker Carlson, Joe Rogan and Rupert Murdoch all got prime seats in the Rotunda – even in front of Trump’s Cabinet nominees. Welcome to Trump’s Washington.

There were only around 600 seats inside the Rotunda, most of which were occupied by members and senators. Just 20 reporters were allowed inside, and we were lucky to have one of those slots.

With now former President Joe Biden and ex-Vice President Kamala Harris sitting just a few feet away, Trump blasted the Biden-Harris administration’s record on everything from inflation to energy policies. He went on to tout his election victory, noting his sweep of the swing states and the fact that he won the popular vote.

There were bizarre moments. Trump said he’d seek to rename Alaska’s Denali Mountain to Mount McKinley. Alaska GOP Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan have long opposed this.

Trump also went on an extended riff about the Panama Canal and vowed to rename the Gulf of Mexico. And when Trump declared Jan. 20 to be “Liberation Day,” Biden smirked.

One particularly interesting moment was when Trump vowed to impose tariffs on foreign imports, which many Republicans think is a bad idea. The applause was noticeably muted compared to Trump’s other promises, which triggered ovations from Republicans.

Ahead of the speech, the incoming administration circulated a memo to congressional Republicans detailing Trump’s plans for immediate action on border security and immigration, energy policy and government reform. Many of them mirrored the executive orders that Trump has promised to roll out on Day One. We scooped that for you on Sunday.

Some of the huge changes at the U.S.-Mexico border that Trump has vowed to enact are already having an impact. For instance, Trump officials shut down use of “CBP One,” an app used by migrants to schedule an appointment to gain legal entry to the United States through a port of entry. Potentially as many as one million migrants had their appointments wiped out. Democrats suggested this could force those migrants to cross the border illegally.

Also: Trump signed several documents in the Capitol, including the acting leaders of Cabinet departments and a proclamation that the U.S. flag should fly at full staff on Inauguration Day.

— John Bresnahan, Jake Sherman, Andrew Desiderio and Melanie Zanona

PARDON WATCH

Biden leaves Washington amid a flurry of pardons

During his last hours in office, former President Joe Biden pardoned members of his family, the Jan. 6 Select Committee, former Joint Chief of Staff Chair Mark Milley and Dr. Anthony Fauci, who helped lead the U.S. government response to the Covid-19 pandemic, setting off a political firestorm across Washington.

Biden — who earlier pardoned his son, Hunter Biden, following his federal criminal convictions of gun and tax charges — issued pardons to his brother James Biden; Sarah Jones Biden, his sister-in-law; Valerie Biden Owens, his sister, and her husband John Owens; and Francis Biden, another brother.

In a statement, Biden said he feared that Republicans would target his family after his departure from the White House.

“My family has been subjected to unrelenting attacks and threats, motivated solely by a desire to hurt me – the worst kind of partisan politics,” Biden said. “Unfortunately, I have no reason to believe these attacks will end….”

More Biden:

Biden’s pardons for the Jan. 6 Select Committee covered members, staff and U.S. Capitol Police and Metropolitan Police officers who testified before the panel. We scooped last week that this was under discussion.

“I believe in the rule of law, and I am optimistic that the strength of our legal institutions will ultimately prevail over politics,” Biden said. “But these are exceptional circumstances, and I cannot in good conscience do nothing.”

Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) and former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), the chair and vice chair of the J6 panel, issued a statement for all the committee members. Thompson and Cheney noted that J6 committee members have faced “specific threats of criminal prosecution and imprisonment by members of the incoming administration, simply for doing our jobs and upholding our oaths of office.”

President Donald Trump — long critical of the Jan. 6 committee — bashed Biden for his actions. Trump has said he plans to pardon the “Jan. 6 hostages” who went to federal prison for their role in the attack on the Capitol.

Trump falsely claimed that the select committee “destroyed and eliminated” evidence from the investigation that would have exonerated him. He also bashed former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, claiming that she somehow wanted Trump supporters to attack the Capitol that bloody day.

House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.), who spent a huge chunk of the last Congress investigating Biden’s family — especially Hunter and James Biden — said the outgoing president’s actions proved that the family was guilty of something and needed to be protected from further scrutiny.

“President Biden’s preemptive pardons for the Biden Crime Family serve as a confession of their corruption as they sold out the American people to enrich themselves,” Comer said.

Republicans may seek to still call those who received Biden pardons to testify, although some of them — Fauci, for instance — have already done so since they left office.

Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-Ga.), the chair of a House Administration subcommittee, plans to continue his investigation of the select committee and has Speaker Mike Johnson’s full support in doing so. “In light of these perceived admissions of wrongdoing, it is imperative that this investigation continue to expose the truth to the American people,” he said in a statement.

We’ll note, as well, that House Republicans ignored subpoenas from the Jan. 6 Select Committee, so we expect that any sitting Democratic lawmakers will do the same. Ditto Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.).

Cheney and former Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) are no longer in office. Neither are former Reps. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) and Elaine Luria (D-Va.), so they may have a more difficult time resisting a subpoena if it comes to that.

— John Bresnahan and Melanie Zanona

THE CAMPAIGN

National Interest Action, a PAC, has a new spot up in D.C. praising President Donald Trump. The spot says that Trump has an opportunity to “make America, bold, prosperous and free. Make us proud of the red, white and blue.”

Heritage Action has a new spot in Philadelphia, D.C. and Los Angeles, urging senators to “confirm Trump’s Cabinet now.

— Jake Sherman