D.C. mayor Muriel Bowser on Monday warned during a press conference that “Trumpism won’t die on January 20” as she announced her request to Interior Secretary David Bernhardt to deny all public gathering permits on federal land across the city ahead of President-elect Joe Biden’s inauguration.
“I am requesting the Secretary of the Department of the Interior cancel any and all public gathering permits in the District of Columbia and deny any applications for public gatherings during the period Jan. 11 through Jan. 24,” Bowser said.
NEW: Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser requests Interior secretary "cancel any and all public gathering permits in the District of Columbia, and deny any applications for a public gathering during the period January 11 – January 24." https://t.co/rfwVxIHGt0 pic.twitter.com/3hpNXZYzC7
— ABC News (@ABC) January 11, 2021
According to ABC, the FBI has warned in a new bulletin of armed protests “at all 50 state capitols from 16 January through at least 20 January, and at the US Capitol from 17 January through 20 January.”
The National Guard has also reportedly been authorized to provide up to 15,000 members for securing Biden’s inauguration.
Bowser’s remarks come a day after she made her request to Bernhardt in a letter issued to Acting DHS secretary Chad Wolf.
Bowser called for several security measures to be taken, which include extending the special security period surrounding the inauguration, the declaration of a pre-disaster zone, and increased coordination between federal law enforcement agencies to secure federal buildings in order to prevent D.C. police from being overwhelmed in responding to other matters in the District.
Bowser called the insurrection at the Capitol last week an “unprecedented terrorist attack” and argued that the measures she outlined in her letter to Wolf are “essential to demonstrating our collective resolve in ensuring the Constitutional transition of power and our nation’s capital in the day’s leading up to it.”
I strongly urge the United States Department of Homeland Security to adjust its approach to the Inauguration in several specific ways, and have outlined them in the following letter to Acting Secretary Wolf. pic.twitter.com/GaxUWfFbxk
— Mayor Muriel Bowser (@MayorBowser) January 10, 2021
