As Donald Trump's inauguration nears, Washington DC residents are fleeing the city, trying to stay away from the event, saying that they do not want to be around that "sort of hostile negative energy".
US President-elect Donald Trump's inauguration is scheduled to be held on Monday (Jan 20) as he takes over the Oval Office.
Alejandra Whitney-Smith, a resident of DC, whose birthday weekend is coinciding with Trump's inauguration, said that she is planning to spend a week in a cabin without technology, the Guardian reported.
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"It (inauguration weekend) coincides with my birthday weekend, which I usually do spend in DC, but when the election happened, I told myself, ‘Oh, no, I can’t be here,’” said Whitney-Smith.
'Ugly side of America'
While commenting on Trump's re-election, she said, "It represents the ugly side of America that people don’t want to acknowledge.”
Smith's mother was working at the Library of Congress during the January 6 attack on the US Capitol in 2021. While recalling the incident, Smith said, "I just remember that feeling of fear for her and then also just concern for me being in the city. I just knew for me – I didn’t want to be around that sort of hostile negative energy.”
She further said that she would hunker down in a cabin with four friends during the inauguration weekend and do some vision boarding, reflection, and reconnection.
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“I guess I maybe mistakenly had a lot of faith that people saw what happened during the first administration, and I figured we as a country wouldn’t regress,” said Whitney-Smith, who works as an attorney.
'Cult-like following'
Noting that she wanted Democratic candidate Kamala Harris to win the elections, Smith said, "But I also know the reality of living in this country as a Black woman. As much as I wanted Harris to win, there was something in me that still told me that America was not ready for their first Black woman president. Not only that, she was running against Donald Trump who has an almost cult-like following that is so powerful.”
Another resident of Washington, DC, Tia Butler, emailed her relatives the day after the election, asking them who was interested in "going on a cruise or some other adventure, January 19-25".
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The memories of the January 6 riots make her not want to be in the city during Trump's inauguration.
Earlier, Butler was expecting some guests in January as she was hoping for a different outcome, however, now she will spend the Dr Martin Luther King Jr holiday weekend in California.
“I have a fundamental set of beliefs and values that differ greatly from the supporters of the president-elect, so it is best that I just remove myself,” said Butler, a human resources executive who had worked for the federal government for nearly two decades before leaving to work at a non-profit.
“It says to me that we’d rather have a criminal leading our country than a person of colour, or a criminal rather than a woman," she added.
During his 2024 presidential campaign, Trump has branded Washington as a "filthy and crime-ridden embarrassment to our nation".
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He further vowed to radically overhaul the capital, recruiting billionaire tech entrepreneur Elon Musk to slash the federal workforce.
(With inputs from agencies)