And then there are the ordinary people who support the winner. Wearing clear plastic raincoats, they must brave weather conditions and slog across icy sidewalks as police transferred from other cities and states assist in the security effort. They often receive incorrect instructions. A far cry from wealthy people drinking high tea in the lobby. Listening to harp music at the Willard Hotel, just a stone’s throw from the White House.
But at this inauguration, more than any other, there is a deep sense of break with the past. The crowd that descended on Washington, wearing red MAGA hats, Trump-emblazoned shirts, and Stars and Stripes regalia, looked more like an army of sans-culottes, the working class that played a key role in the French Revolution. It looks like.
They feel they have conquered and intend to take back the nation’s capital.
However, it’s not clear how that will play out. As Trump boasted at a campaign-style pre-inauguration rally Sunday night, his electoral coalition has expanded. As he railed against his opponents, from Democrats to journalists to immigrants to non-Trump Republicans, he promised his cheering supporters: ”
Other speakers at the raucous rally became more belligerent, criticizing the protesters who stood in Trump’s way. “They tried everything they could to stop this movement and they failed,” said the president’s son, Eric Trump.
“There will be accountability,” said Stephen Miller, a senior adviser to President Trump. “The entire federal bureaucracy is learning that they don’t work for themselves. They work for you, they work for President Trump, and they work for the American people. We We are trying to take back our country and our democracy.”
However, large coalition governments run the risk of tension and escalation. The MAGA crowd may like the sight of tech companies and Wall Street titans looming over them with caps in their hands, but who will recruit whom? Republicans have a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate, but life will be difficult with Republicans holding five seats in the House. And Trump strategists have already backed away from efforts to pass what Trump calls “one big, beautiful bill.” Huge reforms.
“Trump doesn’t have to choose between competing parts of the coalition at this point,” Sean Spicer, a former Trump aide who served as press secretary during part of the president’s first term, told Politico. told. “At this point, there’s no reason why he should choose.”
