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Protesters chant “deescalate, deescalate.” “No more grenades, please,” somebody says.
Rebirth
Multiple flash bangs going off as what looks like rocks or brings are thrown at police pic.twitter.com/qjOJPvkkNa
Obama hung his head in apparent disbelief as his successor called for the “American carnage” to stop, claiming drug gangs were rampaging across a landscape scattered with the tombstones of rusty factories. Trump is no longer just painting this bleak picture to get elected, but to stoke fear and justify radical action: warning ominously of a “great national effort” and “hardships” to come as he rebuilds a supposedly ruined nation.
Parade route from Capital to WH. Entire stands empty. Crowd thin. pic.twitter.com/7AcpJkBO8O
Isolationism
Protesters at the inauguration. Their shirts spell RESIST pic.twitter.com/IrgJkmG8Rx
More than ever before, Trump made clear the era of US nation-building and economic leadership is over. Nato allies will shudder at his withering depiction of American military “subsidy”, while free-traders would recoil at the claim that its middle class wealth has been ripped away by the foreign theft of factories. “America First” was also the slogan of US isolationists in 1940.
7.09pm GMT
Authoritarianism
19:09
Boasting that the military and police were behind him, Trump doubled down on his convention speech promise that “safety will be restored” today. Radical Islamic terrorism will not just be confronted, but “eradicated from the face of the earth”. There will also be little room for dissent in Trump’s united America, where “we all bleed the same red blood of patriots”.
Protesters are chanting at police, who have now formed a line across a street blocks away from the parade route Trump is to take from the Capitol to the White House, shields drawn, to “get back, get back, get back, get back.”
Betrayal
Police set off a flash bang device. “What the fuck,” a protester yells. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” The police occasionally host their shields to block something thrown at them.
Despite a divisive election, there was no room for building political bridges in Trump’s speech. Much of it was spent describing how politicians had enriched themselves at the expense of “the people”, who this billionaire property developer now claims as his own. Though there was no policy in his speech, Trump insists the “time for empty talk is over, now arrives the hour of action”.
There’s another flash bang. They’re loud.
Religion
7.06pm GMT
More than any president in decades, Trump claimed to have religion on his side too. In a speech littered with biblical allusions, he assured Americans they “will be protected by God” and they were all “infused with the breath of life by the same almighty creator”. Before running for president, Trump rarely spoke of his faith but he has learned to stir religion and nationalism into an uncompromising and intimidating brew.
19:06
6.36pm GMT
Clashes between protesters and police resume
18:36
Here’s the live stream of inauguration day action, which includes renewed action in the streets, where protesters are clashing with law enforcement.
Obamas wave goodbye
A line of law enforcement is facing a line of protesters, separated by about 50 years of pavement downtown. The protesters have knocked over a line of newspaper machines which they’ve placed in the street as a kind of low barricade. The police are on the move.
The Obamas turn atop the stairs of their airplane and wave goodbye. Next stop California.
6.59pm GMT
6.25pm GMT
18:59
18:25
There’s a slapstick negotiation around the table of legislators about who gets which pen. Trump, as he signs each document making a nomination official, says something about the nominee. Then the legislators, with the dignity for which they are known, jockey over who gets the keep the pen that signed whose document.
“We have two Nikki Haleys,” Trump says. “Is she applying for two different positions?”
“Terry Branstad, the governor. Longest-serving governor. And China loves him, and he loves China. He’s a good man.”
Ivanka and Jared Trump and their youngest are standing behind Trump’s chair. Melania Trump is standing on Trump’s left. A bit rigidly.
Trump finishes the stack of paper and everyone applauds. Trump shakes hands.
6.20pm GMT
18:20
Trump signing procedural grab-bag
The press secretary tells us what those documents do:
.@POTUS signing 3 things: Mattis waiver bill into law, formal nominations 2 Senate & proclamation for nat'l day of patriotism #Inauguration
“You getting some more pens back there?” Trump says. “This is fun.”
6.17pm GMT
18:17
Obama: 'I'll be right there with you'
This has been the privilege of my life, and I know I speak for Michelle as well... and I can’t wait to see what you do next, and I promise I’ll be right there with you. Yes we did. Yes we can.
6.15pm GMT
18:15
“This isn’t a period, it’s a comma, in the continuing story that is America,” Obama says.
Applause line.
6.15pm GMT
18:15
Trump signing documents at Capitol
As Obama speaks, Trump is seated at a table at the Capitol signing documents. It’s not clear what they are. Paul Ryan and Kevin McCarthy and Roy Blunt and Mitch McConnell are there. But so is Nancy Pelosi.
President Trump signs nominations for his cabinet and proclamation for National Day of Patriotism pic.twitter.com/BLNcY1eJEm
Updated
Updated
at 6.17pm GMT
at 7.00pm GMT
6.13pm GMT
6.58pm GMT
18:13
18:58
Obama:
Voice in the crowd: 'it was so exciting'
Throughout this process, Michelle and I, we’ve just been your frontmen and women. We’ve just been your face and voice. But this has not been about us. It has always been about you. And all the amazing things that have happened in the last ten years have all just been about you.
Lauren Gambino
6.12pm GMT
Military veteran Sarah Lentz said she left the inauguration feeling inspired.
18:12
“I am really looking forward to a complete overhaul of the way things are,” said Lentz, who wore an American flag scarf around her neck.
Obama:
Asked specifically what she wants to change, she said she would like Trump to repeal the president’s healthcare law and expand military spending.
“Michelle and I we’ve really been milking this good-bye thing,” he begins. “So it behooves me to be very brief.”
Lentz came to DC from North Carolina. Though she had followed his campaign closely, this was the first time she saw Trump speak in person, she said.
He says that when they started, they did so “with an abiding faith in the American people.”
“It was so exciting, it’s hard to describe,” she said.
[...]
As she spoke, a man walked by shouting “fascists!” at a crowd of supporters in red caps who had just filtered out of the inauguration.
“All of you came together in small towns and big cities, a whole bunch of you really young, and you decided to believe. And you knocked on doors and made phone calls, and talked to your parents who didn’t know how to pronounce Barack Obama...
“I understand that they’re angry. We would have been angry too, if Hillary had won,” she said. “But these protests, they’re not about peace and love and making things better. They’re about ruining people’s day.”
She cited the protests outside the DeploraBall on Thursday night, organized by a group, DJ20.
“This group - they’re not about change. They’re about ruining someone’s day. There’s no point,” she said.
6.50pm GMT
18:50
The last energy secretary was a nuclear physicist and the one before that was a Nobel laureate in physics.
Here's Rick Perry blowing a bubble with his gum behind President Trump as the rabbi spoke pic.twitter.com/zrvrINKISs
6.47pm GMT
18:47
Lewandowski blocked from ceremony
Corey Lewandowski, the former Trump campaign manager who manhandled a reporter and then told her she was “totally delusional” for thinking he did that, couldn’t get onto the dais today, in spite of this rather desperate call he made:
Corey Lewandowski on the phone outside the Crypt right before Obama and Trump walked outside pic.twitter.com/LfcprwtQpI
Read all about it.
6.41pm GMT
18:41
Hapless George.
El momento cantinflesco de George W. Bush con un impermeable https://t.co/uzWk0GxfJy #InaugurationDay pic.twitter.com/ZE4WjL9wI2
6.40pm GMT
18:40
Trump and Clinton shake on it
There it is: President Donald Trump & Hillary Clinton shake hands before the inaugural luncheon. Looks like he mouthed "thank you" to her. pic.twitter.com/LBb3k5RJY8
