Thread: 18 House Democrats to skip Trump’s inauguration

18 House Democrats to skip Trump’s inauguration

By Heather Caygle and John Bresnahan
01/13/17 05:57 PM EST

Despite raging against President-elect Donald Trump for months, so far there’s no widespread push from Democrats to abandon the controversial Republican’s inauguration. But that could change.

As of Saturday afternoon, 18 House Democrats have announced they’re skipping Trump’s Jan. 20 swearing-in, according to the latest count.

California Rep. Barbara Lee said she wouldn’t endorse a president defined by “racism, sexism, xenophobia and bigotry." And civil rights era icon and veteran Democratic Rep. John Lewis (Ga.) blasted Trump in an interview set to air on NBC's "Meet the Press” Sunday, saying the president-elect is not “legitimate” and he’ll be skipping the inauguration for the first time since he arrived in Congress in 1987. Lewis was one of three black lawmakers to testify against Trump’s attorney general nominee, Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), earlier this week.

In addition to Lee and Lewis, Democratic Reps. John Conyers of Michigan, Katherine Clark of Massachusetts, Raúl Grijalva of Arizona, Luis Gutiérrez of Illinois, José Serrano, Nydia Velazquez and Adriano Espaillat of New York, Earl Blumenauer and Kurt Schrader of Oregon, Lacy Clay of Missouri, Jerrold Nadler of New Jersey, and Mark Takano, Mark DeSaulnier, Jared Huffman, Ted Lieu and Judy Chu of California have all said they’ll skip the ceremony because they can’t stomach Trump.

However, House Democratic leaders say they will be in attendance at the inauguration, if mostly to support the office, not the man.

And similar to the attempt to derail Trump's victory in the Electoral College, no Senate Democrats have joined into the inauguration boycott, at least not yet.

“That’s my responsibility,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said on NPR Friday. “It is the wonderful thing about our country, the peaceful transfer of power.”

“There is nothing ordinary about this inauguration or the man that will be sworn-in as our next President,” Huffman said in a Facebook post announcing his decision. “I will do everything I can to limit the damage and the duration of this chapter, and I believe we can get through it. But I will not sit passively and politely applaud as it begins.”

“My absence is not motivated by disrespect for the office, or motivated by disrespect for the government that we have in this great democracy,” Grijalva said on the House floor. “But as an individual act — yes, of defiance — at the disrespect shown to millions and millions of Americans by this incoming administration, and by the actions we are taking here in this Congress.”

A House Democratic aide said members were asked during a recent caucus meeting to signal whether they were planning on attending for planning purposes. About half of the lawmakers in the room raised their hands.

But several of the Democratic Caucus’ 194 members told POLITICO they either hadn’t made up their mind to attend, or that, if they do skip it, it won’t be because of Trump.

“It’s not interesting, it’s just not interesting,” California Rep. Maxine Waters answered when asked why she wasn’t attending.

House Democratic Assistant Leader Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.) said for him, it depends on the weather.

House Republicans are expected to pass a budget on Friday that clears a path for the repeal of the Affordable Care Act.

“Anything that affects my sinuses, I won't go,” Clyburn said.

Rep. Ruben Gallego of Arizona, who called Trump a “sexual predator” on the House floor, said he’s still undecided, adding the decision ultimately isn’t up to him.

“I have a newborn son at home,” Gallego told POLITICO, saying that might sway him to skip the inauguration.

Other lawmakers said even if they do attend, they also plan to participate in events in their district the next day related to the Women’s March on Washington, which has been billed as a protest against Trump’s presidency.

House Democratic leaders say the decision to go or not is up to each member and they’re not encouraging lawmakers to decide either way. Leaders of the minority caucuses who have repeatedly denounced Trump and his controversial comments on immigration, women and minorities also say they’re not pushing their members on the issue.

Rep. Michelle Lujan Grisham (D-N.M.), who leads the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, said she’ll attend the Friday festivities to celebrate the peaceful transfer of power but isn’t pressuring other CHC members to attend.

Similarly, Congressional Black Caucus Chairman Cedric Richmond (D-La.) said he plans to decide over the weekend whether to watch Trump get sworn in but isn’t having a caucuswide discussion about it.

Richmond, along with Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Lewis, testified against Sessions’ bid to be attorney general.

Across the Capitol, some of Trump’s loudest foes have been less vocal about whether they’ll be in attendance to watch the country’s 45th president sworn into office. Democratic Sens. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Sherrod Brown of Ohio didn’t return requests for comment.

Liberal stalwart and one-time presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders had a simple response when asked about going to the inauguration as he blazed past reporters in the Capitol basement: “Probably.”

Kyle Cheney contributed to this report.

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/0...uration-233613

LOL!! These people are pathetic snowflakes!!!

It occurs to me that they are acting like little spoiled kids that aren't getting the attention they think they deserve. Frankly, in my opinion, no one will miss them.

Will seem more like a Trump Rally if they are not there.

What these people are doing is shirking their duty and sworn oath to stand behind the President of the United States, it is a disgrace. They should all lose their jobs! This is the disgrace of our government today in that they think they can do whatever they want and not do their jobs that they are well paid by the taxpayers for. Trump needs to drain the swamp of these kind of government servants we do not need them.

Perhaps he has been in DC too long and forgets that he, like the rest of us, is only entitled to one vote.

This is what I predict. I predict that after Trump takes office next Friday, the vast majority of the American People, US citizens especially but many legal immigrants as well, are going to see a President working feverishly, determined and fast, to fix our country to benefit all Americans. At that point, all the snowflakes, sore losers, socialists, race-baiters, Muslimites, ethnicity bearers, and other self-interest groups who survive on identity politics will become a part of history, like an old glove on display in a Museum, having lost all political relevancy in the United States.

I am just so excited about this amazing election, where my candidate, a person I've wanted to run for President since 1987, 30 years, 3 long destructive decades for our country, ran, won and will be inaugurated next Friday, that no one, not a soul, not John Lewis, not Jennifer Holliday, not Jake Tapper, not anyone on this forum, no reporter, no article, no media comment, no "intel" person, no "ethics" official, no one can mar the total enthusiasm I have for what takes place on January 20 with the swearing in of Donald J Trump as the 45th President of the United States.

We have been blessed with an enormous gift. No serious common sense person should ever kick a gift-horse in the mouth.

Originally Posted by GeorgiaPeach

Will seem more like a Trump Rally if they are not there.

Yep, every liberal Hillary supporter can stay home and cry in their soup if that's what makes them feel better.

Six False Accusations by John Lewis, Hero-Turned-Hack

David Goldman / Associated Press

by JOEL B. POLLAK15 Jan 2017422

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Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) is a civil rights hero. He is also one of the most partisan members of the Democratic Party, and frequently accuses his political opponents, falsely, of racism.

Lewis also uses his iconic stature to deflect criticism when he is called out for these false attacks, exploiting — and, arguably, demeaning — the civil rights movement.
Here are five of the worst recent examples of what has become, for Rep. Lewis, a shamefully routine practice.

2008: Falsely accused Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) and Gov. Sarah Palin of racism. Lewis attacked McCain and Palin, then running against Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) for president: “Sen. McCain and Gov. Palin are sowing the seeds of hatred and division,” he said, going on to suggest that the Republican ticket were creating the climate for racist terrorism. “[Democrat] George Wallace never threw a bomb … but he created the climate and the conditions that encouraged vicious attacks against innocent Americans … four little girls were killed on Sunday morning when a church was bombed in Birmingham, Alabama.” Years later, McCain still had not forgiven him: “I’ll never forgive John Lewis,” he told AL.com in 2013.

2010: Falsely claimed that Tea Party demonstrators said the “N-word” during anti-Obamacare rally. Lewis joined several other members of the Congressional Black Caucus in claiming that a crowd of thousands of Tea Party protesters on the steps of Capitol Hill had shouted the “N-word” at them when they walked through the crowd — apparently in the hope of provoking a reaction. “It surprised me that people are so mean and we can’t engage in a civil dialogue and debate,” Lewis claimed. But he never proved the accusation — and when Andrew Breitbart offered to donate $10,000, then $100,000, to the United Negro College Fund for any video evidence of the “N-word,” none surfaced — despite hundreds of cameras present.

2012: Falsely accused Republicans of wanting to take Americans back to Jim Crow. Lewis gave a speech at the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina in which he recalled being beaten by white racists, along with fellow Freedom Riders, in 1961. He concluded by implying that Republicans wanted to bring back those days of blood and hatred: “Brothers and sisters, do you want to go back? Or do you want to keep America moving forward?”


2016: Falsely compared Donald Trump to George Wallace. Reviving his theme from 2008, Lewis said that Trump reminded him of the governors of the Jim Crow South and the police who let dogs loose on demonstrators: “I’ve been around a while and Trump reminds me so much of a lot of the things that George Wallace said and did … Sometimes I feel like I am reliving part of my past. I heard it so much growing up in the South…I heard it so much during the days of the civil rights movement. As a people, I just think we could do much better,” he told the Los Angeles Times in an interview.

2017: Falsely claimed Trump is “illegitimate” because of a Russian “conspiracy.” Joining the tin foil hat brigade, Lewis claimed that Trump was a kind of “Manchurian Candidate” put in place by Russia: “I don’t see the president-elect as a legitimate president. … I think there was a conspiracy on the part of the Russians, and others, that helped him get elected.”
Update:

2016: Falsely claimed Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) played no role in the civil rights movement. Lewis, a supporter of former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s bid for the presidency, tried to trash Sanders’s civil rights credentials. “I never saw him. I never met him,” Lewis said. Proof later emerged of Sanders’s arrest in civil rights protests in Chicago in the 1960s.

http://www.breitbart.com/big-governm...hero-partisan/