By Tim Reid and Doina Chiacu
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President-elect Donald Trump said his inauguration on Monday would be held inside the U.S. Capitol rather than outdoors due to extreme cold, marking the first time in 40 years that a U.S. presidential inauguration ceremony will be moved indoors.
“The arctic blast is raging across the country. I don’t want to see people hurt or injured in any way,” Trump said Friday on his Truth Social platform.
“Therefore, I have ordered that the inaugural address, along with prayers and other speeches, be given in the Rotunda of the United States Capitol,” Trump added.
The last time an inauguration was moved indoors due to extreme cold was in 1985 for former Republican President Ronald Reagan’s second inauguration when the afternoon wind dropped to a range of minus 10 to minus 20 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 23 to minus 29 Celsius).
Washington’s weather forecast for Monday calls for temperatures around 19 F (minus 7 degrees C) at the time of Trump’s inauguration, but it will seem even colder with the wind.
Trump said supporters could watch the ceremony on screens inside Capital one (NYSE:) Arena, a 20,000-seat sports hall in downtown Washington.
Trump also said his presidential parade, which will feature marching bands and other groups marching down Pennsylvania Avenue past the White House, will be moved to Capital One Arena. It was not immediately clear how the parade would be organized inside the sports facility.
Trump said he would join the crowd in the arena after he was sworn in.
Trump is scheduled to hold a rally with supporters inside the same arena on Sunday, ahead of his inauguration.
The bitter cold has affected several past inaugurations.
William Henry Harrison, the ninth president of the USA, delivered the longest inaugural address on March 4, 1841, in wet and cold conditions without a hat or coat.
The event and the speech were thought to have contributed to his later death from pneumonia. He died a month after taking office, making his presidential term the shortest in American history.
During the second swearing-in ceremony for President Ulysses S. Grant on March 4, 1873, several cadets and midshipmen standing outside without their coats collapsed, and gale-force winds made Grant’s speech inaudible even to those close to him on the platform, according to the published history National Meteorological Service. The morning low of 4 F (-15 C) that day remains Washington’s coldest March day on record.
