Sen. Amy Klobuchar will take the stage Monday to call to order the inauguration of incoming President Donald Trump and incoming Vice President JD Vance.
The Minnesota Democrat chairs the bipartisan Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies, which is tasked with planning Inauguration Day. She had planned to speak at the event regardless of who won the election.
“This ceremony truly is the peaceful transition of power, and it is on me, even though I did not support the president-elect, to make sure that this ceremony is worthy of our country and worthy of our leadership in the world,” Klobuchar said in an interview ahead of the ceremony.
Klobuchar is the only Democrat who will speak during the ceremony.
“I am speaking in my role, not as a Democrat, but as the chair of the committee,” Klobuchar said. “I suppose I could have said no, but I think that would have been against all tradition. And these traditions are part of the peaceful transition of power.”
Klobuchar also spoke at the 2021 inauguration ceremony and introduced President Joe Biden, just two weeks after rioters descended on the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, causing destruction as lawmakers were certifying his 2020 victory.
Her 2021 speech was celebratory and she talked about how the riots had “awakened us to our responsibilities as Americans.”
“This is the day when our democracy picks itself up, brushes off the dust and does what America always does — goes forward as a nation, under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all,” she said in 2021.