President-elect Donald Trump will be sworn into office in 38 days on the west front of the Capitol, but Democrats are torn on whether they will attend the inauguration.
The Jan. 20, 2025, ceremony, which will mark the peaceful transfer of power from the Biden administration to the second Trump administration, will be attended by President Joe Biden. However, some other Democrats are less certain if they will attend.
Two swing-state Democrats, Sens. Mark Kelly (D-AZ) and Jon Ossoff (D-GA), have told USA Today that they plan to attend the ceremony, with both discussing it as a responsibility. Kelly and Ossoff represent states that Trump won last month, and Ossoff will be one of the most vulnerable incumbent Democratic senators up for reelection in 2026.
Some Democrats said they would celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day, which falls on Inauguration Day in 2025, differently. Reps. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX), Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), and Judy Chu (D-CA) said that was how they would spend Jan. 20.
As Inauguration Day nears, the list of who is going and who is not going is becoming clear, as several Democrats said they had not made up their mind on what they would be doing on Jan. 20.
Trump skipped Biden’s inauguration in 2021, opting to leave the White House and Washington, D.C., in the morning before the ceremony. Besides Trump, it has been customary for the outgoing president to attend the incoming president’s inauguration, as Biden will do for Trump’s ceremony next month.