President-elect Barack Obama is expected to draw as many as 4 million people to his inauguration on January 20, 2009, three or four times larger than previous big events on the National Mall, according to the WASHINGTON POST.
Although only a fraction of those people will be close enough to get a good look at the action, officials are planning extra JumboTrons so all spectators can feel a part of the historic day. Mayor Adrian M. Fenty said visitors will have a difficult choice between getting the best possible views of the swearing-in or the parade: “The parade route will be completely filled way before the inaugural speech even happens,” said Fenty, who was a D.C. Council member in 2005, the most recent inauguration. “That’s something people will have to think about, whether they want to see the parade firsthand or see the inaugural swearing-in and speech. You can’t do both.”
Tickets to the inaugural ceremonies will be provided free of charge and distributed through Members of the 111th Congress. Members of the public interested in attending the Inaugural Ceremonies should contact their Member of Congress or U.S. Senators to request tickets.
No website or other ticket outlet actually has inaugural swearing-in tickets to sell, regardless of what they may claim. Tickets will not be distributed to Congressional offices until the week before the inauguration and will require in-person pick-up.
President-elect Barack Obama is poised to name Washington lawyer Eric Holder as the nation’s first black attorney general.
Holder, 57, met Obama over four years ago and quickly became a member of the President-elect’s inner circle. If he becomes the next chief U.S. law enforcement officer, Holder will try to win the public’s confidence in the Justice Department. In an interview late last year, Holder said:
“Internally, there is a morale problem the likes of which I have never seen before. Externally, there is a crisis of confidence that the nation has with regard to the department.”
According to published reports, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton has engaged three prominent lawyers to help President-elect Barack Obama vet her candidacy for secretary of state.
Attorneys Cheryl Mills, David Kendall and Robert Barnett are working with the Obama transition team to review information about the Clintons’ background and finances, including Bill Clinton’s post-presidential business deals and relationships with foreign governments. All three represented the Clintons on legal matters in the White House, including President Clinton’s dalliance with intern Monica Lewinsky that led to his impeachment in 1998.
Officials say it is going smoothly and both Clintons are cooperating fully. Former President Bill Clinton has already taken an important step to smoothing his wife’s path to the job: he has suggested that would he step away from the daily responsibility for his charitable foundation while his wife served and would alert the State Department to his speaking schedule and any new sources of income.
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