Press release from the Chairman of the Joint Congressional Committee for Inaugural Ceremonies—
Due to heightened security risks following the failed Capitol Hill insurrection, the committee has opted for a virtual inauguration to be held over Zoom. The general public can view a live-streamed screencast of the Zoom session from the official White House government website. As Chairman, I have the "honor" of hosting the session.
The inauguration officially starts at 11 AM EST on Wednesday, January 20th. To ensure that we keep to schedule, all inaugural guests of the President and President-elect will be given the session credentials an hour prior so that they may have ample time to login, though we predict that everyone will only do so in the last ten seconds.
The traditional walkins of key members of the inaugural party will be replaced by "logins" in the following order:
- Second Lady Karen S. Pence. I denied the Vice President's request to have the Second Lady's screen name be "Mother".
- Husband to the Vice President-elect, Douglas C. Emhoff. Mr. Emhoff requested that he be announced as "Second Dude-elect", to which I denied because that sounds ridiculous and this is all being recorded.
- First Lady Melania Trump. The First Lady requested in-person help with logging in. When I informed her that I would send an IT staff member and not the "hot twenty-something military man" that escorted her on Inauguration Day 2017, she retracted her request.
- Wife to the President-elect, Dr. Jill T. Biden. I asked IT to blur everyones' backgrounds by default. Dr. Biden has asked me to keep hers unblurred so that a certain unnamed individual would be able to clearly see her framed Ed.D. diploma hanging on the wall behind her.
- Vice President Michael R. Pence. The Vice President informed me that his video feed will be off and his official portrait will be used as an avatar. He claimed it's to keep the focus on the President-elect, though it's clear the purpose is to prevent another fly-on-head incident.
- President Donald J. Trump. The President has announced that he would not attend the inauguration. I respect his decision. In fact, you might even say I encouraged it. Nevertheless, I was really looking forward to muting him.
- Vice President-elect Kamala D. Harris. I had to inform the Vice President-elect that I, as host, cannot digitally edit a fly onto a guest's avatar.
- President-elect Joseph R. Biden. The President-elect asked me if he may don his aviator sunglasses, to which I said no. So I put the chance at 70-30 that we see a half-baked Top Gun cosplay.
Once all guests are logged in, I will deliver the customary introductory speech. Following that, a number of the nation's most prominent religious leaders will perform scriptural readings. Curiously, President-elect Biden has asked "his buddy Mr. Bryce"—an Amtrak conductor he often sees on the train—to deliver the invocation.
Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor will administer the vice presidential oath of office, to be followed by me screen sharing the YouTube video for Beyoncé's Run the World (Girls) in place of a typical musical performance. Chief Justice John Roberts will then administer the presidential oath of office to the President-elect, which will likely have to be redone because one of them was muted. There will be no usual firing of the cannons following the oath. Instead, I will simply send the following emoji sequence consecutively three times in the chat: 💣💥💨⚫
Newly inaugurated President Biden will then give the inaugural speech. In lieu of a teleprompter, I'm told that Biden's head speechwriter will be DM-ing him lines bit by bit in the chat. There will be an encore appearance from Mr. Bryce as he reads the benediction, and finally Lady Gaga will perform the national anthem while in red, white, and blue-colored sweats.
Guests are required to stay logged in until all members of the inaugural party have logged off, though we anticipate that everyone will have already turned off their video feed and muted themselves so they could get an early start on making lunch while maintaining a veneer of participation, me included.
In the miraculous case that we avoid a HealthCare.Gov-style technical nightmare, we hope the American people will tune in for this momentous occasion.