President-elect Donald Trump and Melania Trump kicked off Inauguration Day with a longtime tradition: Attending services at St. John’s Episcopal Church across Lafayette Square.
Trump was joined by Vice President-elect JD Vance and his wife Usha, and among those attending were Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Meta; Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, and fiance Lauren Sanchez; Apple CEO Tim Cook; Elon Musk; and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai. Also present: Rupert Murdoch, TikTok CEO Shou Chew; UFC’s Dana White and Boris Johnson, the former British prime minister, per a pool report.
The temperature in Washington this morning is 24 degrees, with the windchill even lower, a reason why Trump decided to move the swearing in ceremony indoors. That set off a scramble for seats, as the Capitol Rotunda, where the ceremony will take place, only holds about a thousand people.
Donald Trump arrives at St. John’s Church along with Melania Trump. Mark Zuckerberg is in the background. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
St. John’s, known as the church of presidents, holds significance from the first Trump term. It’s where Trump held up a Bible after walking with members of his administration from the White House. It was amid 2020 protests and riots following the death of George Floyd, and moments earlier, authorities from Park Police had cleared the area of demonstrators.
Earlier, the Trump team released some excerpts of what he would say in his inaugural address to The Wall Street Journal. Trump plans to proclaim a “new era of national success” and call for a “revolution of common sense.”
Meta and Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Google Sundar Pichai, CEO of Apple Tim Cook, Founder of Amazon and Blue Origin Jeff Bezos attend services as part of Inauguration ceremonies at St. John’s Church. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
“My message to Americans today is that it is time for us to once again act with courage, vigor and the vitality of history’s greatest civilization,” Trump will say, per the Journal.
The president is expected to sign dozens of executive orders today — more than 200, per Fox News, including those dealing with the border and immigration, the federal workforce and oil drilling. One executive order will lift an electric vehicle mandate, one of the signature efforts of the Biden administration to address climate change.
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