Donald John Trump completed a remarkable return to power on Monday as he was sworn in as the 47th President of the United States in a midday ceremony. He plans an immediate blitz of orders and actions meant to begin dramatically changing the course of the country.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr administered the 35-word oath of office to Trump in the Rotunda of the Capitol in a ceremony that was moved indoors because of cold weather — the first time this has happened in 40 years. James David Vance was sworn in moments earlier as the nation’s 50th Vice-President by Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh.
“The golden age of America begins right now,” Trump, who overcame impeachments, criminal indictments and a pair of assassination attempts to return as President, declared as he began a 29-minute Inaugural Address.
He added several more hyperbolic but nebulous promises: The “start of a thrilling new era”, a nation “greater, stronger and far more exceptional than ever before”.
“Our sovereignty will be reclaimed. Our safety will be restored. The scales of justice will be rebalanced,” he continued. “Our top priority will be to create a nation that is proud, prosperous and free.”
He added: “My recent election is a mandate to completely and totally reverse a horrible betrayal and all these many betrayals that have taken place and give people back their faith, their wealth, their democracy and indeed their freedom. From this moment on, America’s decline is over.”
Declaring that the government faces a “crisis of trust”, Trump said that under his administration “our sovereignty will be reclaimed. Our safety will be restored. The scales of justice will be rebalanced.”
Trump mentioned the attempt to assassinate him in Butler, Pennsylvania, using striking language to describe how he survived.
“I was saved by God to make America great again,” Trump said to applause.
The shooter was an apparently disturbed 20-year-old local man. Trump baselessly implied the attack was part of a conspiracy to stop him from returning to office.
Much as he did eight years ago, when he decried “American carnage” in his address, he painted a grim portrait of a country on its knees that only he can revive. But even more than in 2017, he largely dispensed with lofty themes and the broad unifying strokes favoured by most Presidents in their Inaugural Addresses, and outlined a series of often-divisive policies.
He vowed to immediately declare a national emergency at the border and send the military to guard it. He said he would end government programmes promoting diversity, equity and inclusion. He said he would rename the Gulf of Mexico as the Gulf of America and promised to seize the Panama Canal. “We’re taking it back,” he said.
Trump was inaugurated in the same building where a mob of his supporters rampaged four years ago in a failed effort to reverse an election that he lost, culminating in a political comeback unlike any in American history. President Joe Biden graciously hosted Trump for coffee at the White House before the ceremony. “Welcome home,” Biden told Trump and his wife, Melania, as they arrived at the executive mansion.
Trump described America’s leadership over the last four years as incompetent and corrupt, echoing some of the darker rhetoric he promoted on a daily basis as a presidential candidate on the campaign trail.
He did not call out his predecessor, Biden, or any other Democrats by name, but there was no question about whom he was talking.
“We now have a government that cannot manage even a simple crisis at home, while at the same time stumbling into a continuing catalogue of catastrophic events abroad,” Trump charged.
He said the current government protects dangerous immigrants instead of law-abiding citizens, protects foreign borders at the expense of American borders and “can no longer deliver basic services in times of emergency”.
And, as he often does, Trump cast himself as uniquely positioned to fix it all.
“All of this will change starting today, and it will change very quickly,” he said.
Feeling vindicated by voters despite his impeachments, indictments and conviction on 34 felony counts, Trump intends to move quickly beyond Inauguration Day rituals to put his stamp back on the government. Among as many as 100 orders he may sign within hours of taking office are directives to initiate a new crackdown on illegal immigration, slap tariffs on trading partners and pardon supporters who were prosecuted for storming the Capitol on January 6, 2021.
Trump, 78, became the oldest person ever inaugurated as President, eclipsing Biden, who was five months younger when he took the oath four years ago. Vance, 40, by contrast, has become the third-youngest Vice-President in history.
Trump also became only the second President since the founding of the republic to reclaim the White House after being defeated for re-election, joining Grover Cleveland, who served nonconsecutive terms in the 19th century.
A cadre of billionaires and tech titans — including Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, Tim Cook and Sundar Pichai — were given prominent positions in the Capitol Rotunda, mingling with Trump’s incoming team before the ceremony began.
Also, there was Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, who is expected to lead an effort to slash spending and federal employees.
Trump began the day with a prayer service at St John’s Episcopal Church.