Defense Department prepares for Inauguration Day
Donald Trump set to be inaugurated as the 47th president on January 20, 2025
WASHINGTON (Gray DC) - The t Task Force - National Capital Region hosted the Rehearsal Concept Drill for Inauguration Day Wednesday, December 18.
The preparation meeting marked the third time the task force went over specific plans for the event, which they mapped out on a scaled version of the National Mall laid out on the floor with a projector.
“Practice, practice, practice,” t Task Force Deputy Commanding General Don Bevis said. “We get to get into the details. We get to talk through the details. This map does a great job to help us visualize where we are in time and space.”
t Task Force Commanding General Trevor Bredenkamp said they plan on involving 12,000 people in the parade, 5,000 of which are service .
“So all of those people have to stage somewhere, and they have to be cleared by the Secret Service, by the lead federal agency for security, and then they have to be moved into their staging area. So it’s a huge undertaking.”
President Joe Biden’s inauguration in 2021 was unusual due to the COVID-19 pandemic. But military leaders say, they have gone through the full event as recently as 2017, so they are drawing on prior experience.
“We have a lot of corporate knowledge,” Bevis said. “A lot of continuity from folks that have done this mission before. And we have those relationships with out interagency partners.”
Bredenkamp said national security is of the upmost importance when planning the ceremony.
“We’ve got Secret Service. We’ve got Capitol Police. We’ve got Metro P.D. We’ve got park police. We’ve got FBI. There are so many organizations out there who are involved in this process, and it does affect the logistics.”
The t Task Force did not have an estimate on crowd size. Some ceremonies have drawn upwards of one million in attendance.
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