Donald Trump’s second inauguration should have been the day his voters took over Washington. That’s a lot ‘Make America Great Again’– caps would turn the park in front of the Capitol red. But when Trump’s speech starts just after noon local time on Monday, there are only a few hundred fans, hundreds of meters from the parliament building. All with their necks bent like wilted flowers, glued to their phone screens. The caps have been replaced by warm hats. The capital turns white from the snow.
Debby McCoy (57) slept in her car on Sunday night, “to be part of this historic moment.” But she, like most Trump fans, was unable to see him speak at a basketball stadium on Sunday night. “The line was endless.” And she doesn’t catch a glimpse of him this day either. The inauguration takes place indoors in very private company. His ordinary voters are left out in the cold.
It’s -7 degrees Celsius in Washington: frozen-toes-cold with a lip-bursting wind and knee-dislocating slipperiness. Not the weather to be outside for long, despite the clear sky and sunshine. Even during the speech, McCoy, wrapped in a thick white scarf, thinks it was nice and shuffles towards the catering industry. Along the way, she yells at a nondescript federal government office building. “Bureaucrats, get out of here. You’re fired! He’s back – with a vengeance.”
Trump is back. And how. In his first speech as president, he painted a dark picture of today’s America. “My election is a mandate to completely and utterly reverse the betrayals that have occurred and give people back their faith, their wealth, their democracy and their freedom. From this moment on, America’s decline is over.”
During his speech, the White House sends out a list of decrees that he will sign the same day. These are mainly aimed at deporting illegally entered immigrants, rolling back climate measures and an offensive against “radical gender ideology”.
Trump supporters follow Donald Trump’s inauguration on their phones.
Photos: Jim Vondruska/Getty Images/AFP, Daniel Cole/AP
And Trump is not alone this time. In 2016, his win was an unpleasant surprise for many and the Republican establishment kept him at a distance when he was not directly serving his agenda of low taxes and conservative judicial appointments. In 2021, he left as a pariah: loser of the elections and perpetrator of the storming of the Capitol where he is now sworn in. Now he has been resurrected with a much more convincing election victory, but above all an accommodating Republican Party and political and financial support from important tech billionaires who control public opinion.
That entourage celebrates for days in Washington. The best hotels cost at least a thousand dollars per night. Villas, restaurants and ballrooms are rented for private parties. Trump’s cabinet has more billionaires than ever. Real estate agents are reporting a shortage in the absolute luxury segment of the housing market as they move to the capital.
McCoy shrugs off the difference between the inauguration experience of the people who financially support Trump and the voters who helped him into power. “Yes, I am disappointed that the ceremony is not outside and we can all get together. But then I would have been at the very back instead of here with a view of the Capitol,” she says. “And then they certainly wouldn’t have let us ordinary people into their fancy parties.”
Washington is and remains a ‘blue’ city: 90 percent of residents voted for Kamala Harris in November. Some Trump haters have agreed to spend Inauguration Day dressed entirely in black. But there is hardly any protest against or friction with the Trump army that has descended on the capital. While Democratic voters said a sad farewell to Barack Obama in 2017, there is little mourning that Joe Biden is leaving the White House. It doesn’t help his popularity that his last act on the way out was protecting his own family from possible prosecution by Trump’s Justice Department.
“Are you really going out on the street with that cap? This is DC,” said Alex Kinsey, 23, of St. Louis, as he and Josh Walgreen, 23, of Chicago, left their hotel in the morning. “But we haven’t had any problems,” says Walgreen, who is wearing a light jacket and his red MAGA cap despite the cold. “I’m glad that everyone is interacting normally. Disagreements are always magnified on social media, but now that we are here, it is not so bad.”
Even their hotel costs are manageable. Perhaps because people who heard Friday that the dedication ceremony had been rescheduled had canceled, they were able to get a hotel near the White House for just over $300 a night. But they see disappointingly little of the Republican festivities. On Sunday, they waited in line for eight-and-a-half hours in vain to attend a Trump event, so they’re not even trying this day.
After all the ceremonies, Trump should hurry up with his policy, Walgreen believes. “Because there is such dissatisfaction everywhere that the Democrats can win the midterm elections again within two years. Then our party is over.”