Clinton now a spectator a few feet from history
Hillary Clinton probably thought often about what it would be like to look out on the lawn of the Capitol as the page was finally turned on the divisive 2016 election, but she would have imagined a very different tableau than the one before her Friday.
The defeated Democratic presidential nominee was looking on from fewer than 10 seats away as Donald Trump took the oath of office. She was fulfilling the role of former first lady instead of becoming the first woman inaugurated as president — the outcome that seemed nearly certain less than three months ago.
“I’m here today to honor our democracy & its enduring values. I will never stop believing in our country & its future,” Clinton said in a tweet just before the ceremony began.
Clinton sat beside former President Bill Clinton, her only job to be part of the tradition that the living former presidents are witness to the peaceful assumption of power by a new leader.
Clinton was a spectator to a scene she had told voters was unthinkable and gravely risky for the future of the country. Although she won the popular vote, she lost the Nov. 8 election, and, Friday, she watched as Trump, a man she had called reckless, unqualified and unfit, was administered the oath of office.
She was there even as more than 60 Democratic members of Congress boycotted the ceremony in protest of the man who defeated her. She was there even as many Democrats, and many of her close friends, urged her to stay away.
She smiled broadly as she and Bill Clinton took their seats to scattered applause. And she grinned as Michelle Obama joined the Clintons as well as former Presidents George W. Bush and Jimmy Carter and former first ladies Laura Bush and Rosalynn Carter. George H.W. Bush and his wife, Barbara, did not attend because of illness.