Politics

(Reuters) – President-elect Donald Trump on Monday said he was choosing Joseph Nocella Jr. as his pick to become U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York.

“Judge Nocella has a strong record of bringing Law and Order to the incredible people of New York, serving as a Nassau County District Court Judge, and Family Court Judge,” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social.

(Reporting by Ryan Patrick Jones)

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Living to 100 let Jimmy Carter fulfill his wish to vote for Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris against Republican Donald Trump in November. His death means flags at the White House will be at half-staff when Trump regains the presidency on Jan. 20.

Starkly different in their political beliefs and personal lives, in their actions as president and after leaving office, Carter and Trump will again be intertwined as the memory and legacy of one linger while the other is inaugurated for a second time. It’ll be another example of how the two have continued to overlap in often contradictory ways, even though their terms were separated by nearly 40 years.

Trump singled out Carter for intense criticism during the 2024 campaign, repeatedly mocking him to fire up supporters. He called President Joe Biden “the worst” but said he made Carter look “brilliant” by comparison. He even delivered the line on Carter’s 100th birthday in October.

The president-elect also promised to use his second term to undo some of Carter’s signature accomplishments. He wants to roll back environmental protections, potentially renege on a 1977 treaty ceding control of the Panama Canal back to its home country and dismantle the federal Department of Education that Carter helped create in 1979.

Yet Trump is planning to attend Carter’s funeral, and his statement marking the former president’s passing was gracious. He wrote: “The challenges Jimmy faced as President came at a pivotal time for our country and he did everything in his power to improve the lives of all Americans. For that, we all owe him a debt of gratitude.”

Trump also called Carter “a good man” who was “very consequential, far more than most Presidents, after he left the Oval Office.”

“While I strongly disagreed with him philosophically and politically, I also realized that he truly loved and respected our Country, and all it stands for,” Trump wrote in a post on his social media network. “He worked hard to make America a better place, and for that I give him my highest respect.”

Amber Roessner, a University of Tennessee professor and media historian, said that, for candidate Trump, “Carter became the perfect metaphor with which to critique the Biden administration” given the parallel battles the Democrats faced on inflation and unrest in the Middle East. But she said Carter and Trump share a similar political ethos as outsiders who stoked populism and challenged and vexed the political establishment.

Roessner, who sat down with Carter for an extended interview in 2014, said both he and Trump successfully presented themselves as authentic in an often otherwise flighty and transactional world of politics.

“Carter’s was certainly a message of love and moral reform while Trump has offered a more divisive kind of politics of hate,” she said. “Both of them fit the political moment.”

Carter, the 39th president, was an outspoken and devout Baptist who was married to the same woman for 77 years and taught Sunday school while president and afterward. He offered this advice to Trump in 2019: “Keep the peace, promote human rights and tell the truth.”

Trump, the 45th and soon-to-be 47th president, has been married three times and was convicted of making hush money payments to cover up an extramarital affair with a porn actor.

Yet, as candidates and as presidents, Carter and Trump both knew how to best maximize media coverage and were both critical of the media, Roessner said, especially political reporters they viewed as out of touch.

She pointed to a 1976 interview with Playboy magazine in which Carter found fault with the reporters who followed his campaign, saying: “The traveling press have zero interest in any issue unless it’s a matter of making a mistake. … There’s nobody in the back of this plane who would ask an issue question unless he thought he could trick me into some crazy statement.”

Carter, though, never went nearly as far as Trump, who has branded the press the “enemy of the people,” dismisses factual reporting he doesn’t like as “fake news” and criticizes journalists at his rallies harshly enough to spur loud booing from the audience.

During the 2016 election, Carter cautioned his party about underestimating Trump’s appeal. Both men also defy ideological labels, standing out for their willingness to talk to dictators and isolated nations.

In 2018, Carter offered to travel to North Korea on the Trump administration’s behalf. The following year, Trump called Carter to speak about China. He later described what was said as a “very good telephone conversation” and added that he’d “always liked President Carter.”

Things weren’t always cordial, though.

In 2014, Trump mistakenly referred to the former president at a conservative conference as “the late, great Jimmy Carter.” While Trump was president, Carter suggested that an investigation into Russian influence in the 2016 presidential election might “show that Trump didn’t actually win,” even though the investigation never came close to substantiating that baseless claim.

Carter also criticized Trump for withholding U.S. funds to the World Health Organization during the coronavirus pandemic. Trump said during a G20 Summit in 2019 that Carter was nice but “a terrible president.”

Lindsay Chervinksy, a presidential historian and executive director of the George Washington Presidential Library at Mount Vernon in Virginia, said that Trump’s statements after Carter’s death were “what you do when a president dies and is considered to be best form” but that the president-elect’s more derogatory campaign comments on Carter were probably closer to his real thoughts.

Indeed, Trump has already expressed annoyance at Biden’s directing flags be at half-staff in Carter’s honor for his inauguration, posting that “The Democrats are all ‘giddy’” about it.

“Nobody wants to see this, and no American can be happy about it,” he wrote.

Despite what unfolded post-presidency, Carter’s deflated reputation when he left the White House in 1981 seemed frozen for Trump, who often uses that decade of his own rise to fame as a touchstone.

In 2020, Trump posted on social media that he had “lined up 52 Iranian sites as targets” if Iran retaliated for the targeted killing of Gen. Qassem Soleimani. He said that number represented the 52 American hostages taken by Iran when Carter was in office.

“Much of what Trump says is shaped by the 1980s,” Chervinksy said. “In that era Carter was synonymous with what it meant to be a failed, one-term president.”

Carter significantly rehabilitated his political image after his presidency. Following his landslide reelection defeat, Carter returned to Georgia, where he and his wife, Rosalynn, established the Carter Center in 1982. He then spent decades advocating for democracy, mediating international conflict and advancing public health globally. The couple also built houses with Habitat for Humanity.

The former president was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002.

Trump never accepted his defeat to Biden in 2020 and shunned the typical post-presidency efforts to become an elder statesman and burnish his legacy with new endeavors. Instead, he vowed retribution against political enemies and mounted a political comeback that made him the first president since Grover Cleveland in 1893 to reclaim the White House in nonconsecutive terms.

Carter entered hospice care in February 2023. He said his goal was “only trying to make it to vote for Kamala Harris,” his grandson, Jason Carter, told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution in August.

The former president cast his ballot for Harris by mail on Oct. 16. He died two months and two weeks later.

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Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has announced his resignation, telling the nation that “internal battles” mean he “cannot be the best option” in the next election.

Trudeau said Monday he has asked the president of his Liberal Party to begin the process to select a new leader. He has faced rising discontent over his leadership, and the abrupt departure of his finance minister late last year signaled growing turmoil within his government.

Parliament will be suspended until March 24. It had been due to resume Jan. 27. The timing will allow for a Liberal Party leadership race.

Trudeau had been the second-youngest prime minister in Canada’s history when he was elected in 2015, and he had been planning to run for a fourth term in next year’s election even as discontent in his party grew. He said that “I have always been driven by my love for Canada” and repeatedly described himself as a fighter.

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The opposition New Democratic Party had propped up Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Liberal Party for years. Now NDP leader Jagmeet Singh has responded to Trudeau’s resignation announcement by saying that “it doesn’t matter who the next Liberal is. They’ve let you down. They do not deserve another chance.”

Singh says that “as soon as there is a confidence vote, we will be voting against the government.”

Meanwhile, the president of the Liberal Party says he will call a national board meeting this week to begin the “nationwide democratic process of selecting a new leader of the party.”

Chrystia Freeland, the finance minister who resigned last month and sent discussion about a resignation by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau into overdrive, has thanked him for his years of service and wished him well.

Freeland is a likely candidate for prime minister after being Trudeau’s most powerful minister.

Trudeau in his resignation comments called Freeland “an incredible political partner” and said he had hoped she would continue as his deputy prime minister.

Journalists asked what happened between them and he replied that “I not someone who is in the habit of sharing private conversations.”

Opposition Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre has responded to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s resignation announcement. In a taped message posted on X, Poilievre said that “Canadians desperate to turn the page on this dark chapter in our history might be relieved today that Justin Trudeau is finally leaving.”

Poilievre also takes aim at the Liberal Party: “But what has really changed? Every Liberal MP in power today and every potential Liberal leadership contender fighting for the top job helped Justin Trudeau break the country over the last nine years.”

One person likely to seek power in the Liberal Party after Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s resignation is Mark Carney, the former head of the Bank of Canada and later the Bank of England.

Carney has long been interested in entering politics and becoming prime minister, and Trudeau tried to recruit him to join his government.

Carney in a post on X thanked Trudeau for his contributions and sacrifices. He adds: “Wishing you the best for your next chapters.”

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says Canada deserves a Parliament that functions. He took questions after announcing his resignation Monday morning.

Trudeau said Parliament has been “entirely seized” by what he called obstruction and a total lack of productivity. He said this has been the longest-serving minority government in Canadian history.

And in some of his final comments to the media, Trudeau shared his thoughts on opposition Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre. He said Poilievre has a “very small vision” for Canada, describing it as “stopping the fight against climate change,” backing off on “strength in diversity” and “attacking journalists.”

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has announced his resignation, telling the media that “internal battles” mean he “cannot be the best option” in the next election.

Trudeau says he has asked the president of his Liberal Party to begin the process to select a new leader. He has faced rising discontent over his leadership, and the abrupt departure of his finance minister late last year signaled growing turmoil within his government.

Shortly before he spoke, an official familiar with the matter said Parliament will be suspended until March 24. It had been due to resume Jan. 27. The timing will allow for a Liberal Party leadership race. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak about the matter publicly.

Trudeau came to power in 2015 after 10 years of Conservative Party rule, and had initially been praised for returning the country to its liberal past. But the 53-year-old leader, the son of Pierre Trudeau, one of Canada’s most famous prime ministers, became deeply unpopular with voters in recent years over a range of issues, including the soaring cost of food and housing, and surging immigration.

The political upheaval comes at a difficult moment for Canada internationally. U.S. President-elect Donald Trump has threatened to impose 25% tariffs on all Canadian goods if the government does not stem what Trump calls a flow of migrants and drugs in the U.S.

That’s even though far fewer of each crosses into the U.S. from Canada than from Mexico, which Trump has also threatened.

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TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) — A self-described struggling artist from Missouri, Jacob Burmood says he could have used the $3,500 offered by a South Florida suburb to exhibit one of his abstract metal sculptures. But his heart “just sank” when he learned the city contract prohibited him from “engaging in a boycott of Israel.”

Burmood turned down the offer, saying he couldn’t sign in good faith “because that would normalize this type of language in contracts. And it would normalize what’s happening right now” in Gaza.

Florida is among more than 30 states that block government agencies from hiring companies that boycott Israel. Florida’s law has been on the books for years, yet as the 15-month Israel-Hamas war grinds on with no end in sight, it’s sparking concerns among some artists and advocates beyond the state’s borders.

Supporters of an economic boycott of Israel say the campaign uses nonviolence to resist what they say are Israel’s unjust policies toward Palestinians, comparing the strategy to the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa. Opponents say the campaign veers into antisemitism and aims to delegitimize Israel itself.

Burmood requested the city of Sunrise remove the anti-boycott language from the contract, but city staff told him it’s required by state law, according to emails shared with The Associated Press. A spokesperson for the city, Eric Lachs, told the AP that Sunrise “respects the decision of the artist to not participate in our art program.”

Les Gomez-Gonzalez, an artist based in Miami, said it “was not an option” to sign a similar contract for showing their work at a gallery in a building owned by the city of Pembroke Pines.

“This perpetuates the censorship of those standing in solidarity with Palestine, and manipulates access to adequate funding,” Gomez-Gonzalez said.

Shortly after Hamas’ October 2023 attack on Israel that sparked the war in Gaza, Florida’s Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis said his state stands with the key U.S. ally and emphasized “our commitment to Israel and our fight against anti-Israel sentiments.”

In the eyes of Lee Rowland, making artists affirm specific political statements is a violation of their First Amendment right to free expression. Rowland is the executive director of the National Coalition Against Censorship, an advocacy group that has been tracking court challenges to laws banning the boycott, divestment and sanctions campaign, or BDS.

“These kind of contract provisions absolutely violate the right to free expression,” she said, “because they condition a government contract on your political beliefs and behaviors.”

The governor’s press secretary, Jeremy Redfern, pushed back on that claim, saying Florida’s law deals with “conduct, not speech.”

Burmood said he has felt powerless watching the widespread destruction in Gaza — backed by a record $17.9 billion in U.S. military aid to Israel.

Refusing to sign Florida’s government contract in December was a small act of protest he could take from halfway across the world in St. Joseph, Missouri.

“I am not going to be silenced,” he said. “Whatever my tiny little voice can do, I’m going to use it.”

___ Associated Press writer David Fischer in Miami contributed to this report. Kate Payne is a corps member for The Associated Press/Report for America Statehouse News Initiative. Report for America is a nonprofit national service program that places journalists in local newsrooms to report on undercovered issues.

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By Ann Saphir and Michael S. Derby

(Reuters) – Federal Reserve Vice Chair of Supervision Michael Barr’s decision on Monday to resign early from his regulatory oversight role sets up an early test of how Donald Trump will try to shape the U.S. central bank during his second term as president.

Barr said on Monday he plans to vacate his leadership role on the Fed’s Board of Governors on Feb. 28, but stay on as a governor, with a term that runs through January 2032. 

The move leaves Trump no immediate opening to shape interest rate setting by nominating someone new to the Fed’s board. But it does give him the option to quickly elevate a current board member to run the Fed’s banking oversight function in a way more in line with his lighter-touch preferences, and avoids what could have been a disruptive legal showdown over political control of the role. 

Barr is only the second person to be the Fed’s vice chair for supervision, a position created after the 2007-2009 financial crisis and the flurry of regulatory reform that followed. 

“Regardless of whether or not this was a kowtow or for other reasons, this will likely be precedent-setting for how political the role of the vice chair for supervision is,” said Steven Kelly, associate director of research at the Yale School of Management’s Program on Financial Stability. “Barr stepping down likely means the role will continue to roll over with presidential administrations, much more like the other banking agencies’ leadership roles.”

Fed Governor Michelle Bowman, who has repeatedly staked out her opposition to Barr’s tougher regulatory approach, is a likely pick for his successor under the incoming Trump administration, analysts said.

At the same time, Barr’s decision to remain a Fed governor, which will see him continue to vote on interest rate decisions, may help fortify the central bank’s political independence as far as monetary policy goes, some observers said. Central bankers and economists generally view insulation from political sway on interest rate decisions to be critical to inflation-control efforts.

“The hypothesis that the Fed (Powell) is more willing to work with Republicans on regulation and supervision, as a way to preserve monetary policy independence, might have legs,” LH Meyer analyst Derek Tang wrote.

Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s role as the central bank’s chief does not end until 2026.

WHITE HOUSE INFLUENCE

Graham Steele, an academic fellow at Stanford Law School and former assistant secretary at the Treasury Department in the Biden administration, worries Barr’s move may create long-term issues for the central bank. Quitting the vice chair role now “sends the message that the Fed is not independent – either in the administrative agency sense or the central bank sense.”

“I imagine that the goal here was to avoid a legal and political fight, but it sets its own precedent about political control,” Steele said of the resignation. “The ones forcing the confrontation are the incoming administration and the banking industry, not Vice Chair Barr, who I think is right on the law.”

Barr has only infrequently remarked on monetary policy during his two and a half years at the Fed, but has always voted with Powell. 

Trump railed frequently against Powell for rate decisions he disagreed with during his first term in the White House, and analysts have speculated on whether he would try to remove the Fed chief in an effort to exert control. Powell has said such a move would not be legal. 

The president-elect’s advisors have been looking for ways to increase the White House’s influence over the Fed, including potentially removing Barr from his leadership role.

Any effort to do so “could also have set the precedent for a president to also fire the Fed’s chairman,” said Brian Gardner, chief Washington policy strategist at Stifel. “That issue has been averted for now.”

(Reporting by Ann Saphir; Editing by Paul Simao)

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By Nathan Layne and James Oliphant

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Four years after supporters of then-President Donald Trump stormed the U.S. Capitol in a failed bid to thwart certification of the 2020 election result, a mastermind of the effort, Enrique Tarrio, on Monday asked Trump for a full pardon for his actions.

Tarrio, a former leader of the Proud Boys far-right militant group, was sentenced to 22 years in federal prison for helping to direct the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol that resulted in injuries to more than 140 police officers and five deaths.

The request, in a letter, came through Tarrio’s lawyer, Nayib Hassan of Miami, two weeks before Trump is due to return to the White House. Trump has said he will consider pardoning many of those convicted in connection with the breach of the Capitol that day, perhaps as early as his first day in office.

On Monday, the new Congress formally certified the results of the 2024 election that returned Trump to power, this time without incident. Inauguration Day is Jan. 20. 

Hassan said the request marked the first time Tarrio has asked Trump directly for a pardon. The lawyer said he also has sent the letter to multiple people in Trump’s orbit making the case for his client. 

“We’re making all efforts possible to ensure that this communication goes up to President-elect Trump,” Hassan said in an interview.

Trump’s transition team did not respond to a request for comment on Tarrio’s pardon request but reiterated that Trump will consider pardons on a case-by-case basis.

“President Trump will pardon Americans who were denied due process and unfairly prosecuted by the weaponized Department of Justice,” said transition spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt. 

A source close to Trump’s transition team said to expect pardons “for a lot of people, particularly for people who haven’t been convicted of anything yet. If you were convicted of assaulting a cop, that’s one thing. If you were convicted of trespassing, that’s another category.”

According to the U.S. Justice Department, 1,583 people have been charged with a crime connected to the siege of the Capitol, with about 1,100 having had their cases fully adjudicated. More than 700 have either served their sentences or were never incarcerated. 

During the 2024 presidential campaign, Trump frequently referred to the Jan. 6 defendants as patriots who fell victim to what he called a politicized justice system, and he pledged he would pardon many of them. 

In an interview with NBC News last month, Trump said there could be “some exceptions” to his pardons if the individuals had acted “radical” or “crazy” during the assault.

Tarrio’s case, in particular, could pose a challenge for Trump. Tarrio was convicted in May 2023 of seditious conspiracy, along with three other members of the Proud Boys. 

Prosecutors detailed how he remotely encouraged members who were in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021, to storm the U.S. Capitol to “do what must be done” to stop the certification of the election in Democrat Joe Biden’s favor. Tarrio’s 22-year sentence was the longest handed down to a Jan. 6 conspirator. 

While Congress was certifying the 2024 election on Monday, advocates and family members of those charged in the attacks gathered at a Washington hotel to demand that all of the Jan. 6 defendants be granted clemency.

Suzzanne Monk, a longtime advocate for those defendants, said she and her colleagues have been having conversations with key people in Trump’s orbit.

“We’re predicting 100% pardons on Day One, or commutations for everyone to be released on Day One,” Monk said. 

(Reporting by Nathan Layne and James Oliphant. Additional reporting by Steve Holland in West Palm Beach, Florida, and Helen Coster in New York. Editing by Colleen Jenkins and Howard Goller)

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Some lawmakers emotionally recalled the violence. Others said they’d rather move on. And some said it wasn’t violent at all.

The certification Monday of Donald Trump’s presidential victory further exposed the divide, and the tension, among members of Congress over Jan. 6, 2021 — as Trump has called the bloody attack by his supporters “a day of love” and has promised to pardon rioters who have been convicted of crimes related to that day once he is in office.

Unlike four years ago, when the joint session of Congress to count electoral votes was interrupted by rioters trying to break down the doors, there was very little drama this Jan. 6 and no overt tension in the room as lawmakers read out each state’s electoral votes. Vice President Kamala Harris gaveled down her own defeat. Democrats did not object to any of the votes.

Standing beside windows where Trump’s supporters first broke into the building that day, Democratic Senate leader Chuck Schumer said Democrats want to “serve as an example” for Republicans.

The Democrats lost last year’s election, Schumer said, but “when you lose an election you roll up your sleeves and try for the next one. You don’t deny that you lost.”

The rioters who violently breached the Capitol four years ago, breaking in after a brutal fight with police, were echoing Trump’s false claims that the election was stolen and that President Joe Biden’s win was “rigged.” Trump maintained — and still maintains — that he won the election even though it was certified by all 50 states and courts across the country reaffirmed Biden’s win.

Four years later, the Republican Party is still divided over the attack. On Monday, as they gleefully certified Trump’s win, some GOP lawmakers made a point of downplaying the violence four years ago, defending the more than 1,250 rioters convicted of crimes.

Rep. Mike Collins, R-Ga., posted on X early Monday morning that “individuals entered the Capitol, took photos, and explored the building before leaving,” and have since been “hunted down” and treated unjustly. Just after the joint session ended, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., repeated her plea that all of the rioters be pardoned and said “this country should never allow this type of abuse of our justice system again.”

Other Republicans remembered the day differently — a signal that Trump’s pledge to pardon rioters could become politically fraught even within his own party. It’s unclear, so far, whether he will try to pardon all of them or just those who were not violent.

“I was here,” said Republican South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, one of Trump’s closest allies. “Ask the cops who got beaten up. Not everybody was violent, but there was definitely violence, and the people who defiled the Capitol and attacked police officers, they deserve to be held accountable.”

Republican Sen. Mike Rounds of South Dakota said that “the violence that occurred on that particular day, I will not forget.”

“It was real,” he said. “And we have to recognize that was a very, very bad day in our country’s history.”

More common are Republicans who don’t want to talk about it at all.

“That was a long day and I don’t want to rehash it,” said Oklahoma Sen. Markwayne Mullin, who was then in the House and helped blockade the doors as rioters tried to beat them down. He said he hadn’t talked about it since the one-year anniversary of the attack.

“That’s in the past for me,” Mullin said. “I tell people all the time, you can’t drive out the rearview mirror.”

New Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., told reporters, “I was here, and I’ve said what I have to say about that day, and I’m now looking forward.”

On possible pardons, “it’s going to be a call that the president has to make,” Thune said.

Democrats marked the fourth anniversary by remembering their own experiences that day, and preparing for Trump’s return to office.

Georgia Rep. Hank Johnson said after the session that he was angry that they were there to certify Trump’s win after what happened last time.

“We performed our perfunctory duty,” Johnson said. “It should have been perfunctory four years ago. I’m angry that it was not.”

Johnson was trapped in the House gallery with other Democrats who were spacing out in the chamber amid the coronavirus pandemic. The group was trapped as people tried to beat the doors down below, and ducked below seats as rioters hunting lawmakers were rattling the doors behind them.

Some members of that group — who have dubbed themselves the “gallery group” — gathered for a photo Monday. Washington Rep. Pramila Jayapal posted the photo on X.

“We will not forget,” she wrote.

Metropolitan Police Officer Daniel Hodges, one of the hundreds of police officers who fought the rioters four years ago, sat in the gallery on Monday as Congress certified Trump’s win, a guest of California Sen. Adam Schiff.

Hodges, who was captured on video crushed between two doors as some of the rioters beat him, said he found this year’s proceeding to be “very dry” — like it should have been four years ago, he said.

Otherwise, he was marking the day by doing his job, like many of the other officers who spent the day protecting the city and members of Congress.

“I was at work before this and I’m going back to work afterward,” he said.

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Congress certified President-elect Donald Trump as the winner of the 2024 election in proceedings Monday that unfolded without challenge, in stark contrast to the Jan. 6, 2021, violence as his mob of supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol.

Lawmakers convened under heavy security and a winter snowstorm to meet the date required by law to certify the election. Layers of tall black fences flanked the Capitol complex in a stark reminder of what happened four years ago, when a defeated Trump sent rallygoers to “fight like hell” in what became the most gruesome attack on the seat of American democracy in 200 years.

The whole process this time concluded swiftly and without unrest. One by one, a tally of the electoral votes from each state was read aloud to polite applause in the House, no one objected and the results were certified.

“Today, America’s democracy stood,” Vice President Kamala Harris, a Democrat, said after presiding over the session — as is the role of her office — and her own defeat to Trump.

But Trump’s legacy from 2021 leaves an extraordinary fact: The candidate who tried to overturn the previous election won this time and is legitimately returning to the White House, his inauguration in two weeks.

While Monday’s outcome revived a U.S. tradition that launches the peaceful transfer of presidential power, what’s unclear is if Jan. 6, 2021, was the anomaly or if this year’s calm becomes the outlier.

Trump denies that he lost four years ago, muses about staying beyond the Constitution’s two-term White House limit and promises to pardon some of the more than 1,250 people who have pleaded guilty or were convicted of crimes for the Capitol siege. He calls Jan. 6, 2021, a “day of love.”

Trump said online Monday that Congress was certifying a “GREAT” election victory and called it “A BIG MOMENT IN HISTORY.”

Still, American democracy has proven to be resilient, and Congress, the branch of government closest to the people, came together to affirm the choice of Americans.

With pomp and tradition, the day unfolded as it has countless times before, with the arrival of ceremonial mahogany boxes filled with the electoral certificates from the states — boxes that staff were frantically grabbing and protecting when Trump’s mob stormed the building last time.

Senators walked across the Capitol — which four years ago had filled with roaming rioters, some defecating and menacingly calling out for leaders, others engaging in hand-to-hand combat with police — to the House to begin certifying the vote.

The House chaplain, Margaret Kibben, who delivered a prayer during the violence four years ago, made a simple request as the chamber opened to “shine your light in the darkness.”

Harris stood at the dais where then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi was abruptly rushed to safety last time as the mob closed in and lawmakers fumbled to put on gas masks and flee, and shots rang out as police killed Ashli Babbitt, a Trump supporter trying to climb through a broken glass door toward the chamber.

And Harris certified her own defeat — much the way Democrat Al Gore did in 2001, Republican Richard Nixon did in 1961 and then-Vice President Mike Pence did four years ago.

When Harris read the tally, the chamber broke into applause: first Republicans for Trump’s 312 electoral votes, then Democrats for Harris’ 226.

Vice President-elect JD Vance had joined his former Senate colleagues in the front row, and was surrounded afterward with congratulatory handshakes, hugs and photos.

Within half an hour the process was done.

There are new procedural rules in place after what happened four years ago, when Republicans echoed Trump’s lie that the election was fraudulent and challenged the results their own states had certified.

Under changes to the Electoral Count Act, it now requires one-fifth of lawmakers, instead of just one in each chamber, to raise any objections to election results.

But none of that was necessary.

Republicans who challenged the 2020 election results now express greater trust in U.S. elections after Trump defeatedHarris.

Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., who led the House floor challenge in 2021, said people at the time were so astonished by the election’s outcome and there were “lots of claims and allegations.”

This time, he said: “I think the win was so decisive. … It stifled most of that.”

And Democrats frustrated by Trump’s victory nevertheless accepted the choice of the American voters, with House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries saying his side of the aisle is not “infested” with election deniers.

“There are no election deniers on our side of the aisle,” Jeffries said last week on the first day of the new Congress, to applause from Democrats in the chamber.

Harris said afterward that Jan. 6 this time was “about what should be the norm and what the American people should be able to take for granted, which is one of the most important pillars of our democracy: the peaceful transfer of power.”

Last time, far-right militias helped lead the mob to break into the Capitol in a war zone-like scene. Officers have described being crushed and pepper-sprayed and beaten with Trump flag poles, “slipping in other people’s blood.”

Leaders of the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys have been convicted of seditious conspiracy and sentenced to lengthy prison terms. Many others faced prison, probation, home confinement or other penalties.

Pence, who had been rushed into hiding that day as rioters threatened to hang him for his refusal to reject Biden’s win, wrote online that he welcomed what he called “the return of order and civility” to the certification process.

Trump was impeached by the House on the charge of inciting an insurrection that day but was acquitted by the Senate. At the time, GOP leader Mitch McConnell blamed Trump for the siege but said his culpability was for the courts to decide.

Federal prosecutors subsequently issued a four-count indictment of Trump for working to overturn the election, but special counsel Jack Smith withdrew the case last month after Trump won reelection, adhering to Justice Department guidelines that sitting presidents cannot be prosecuted.

Biden, in one of his outgoing acts, awarded the Presidential Citizens Medal to Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., and former Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., who had been the chair and vice chair of the congressional committee that conducted an investigation into Jan. 6, 2021.

Trump has said those who worked on the Jan. 6 committee should be locked up.

___

Associated Press writers Fatima Hussein and Ashraf Khalil contributed to this report.

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Congress certified President-elect Donald Trump’s election under the tightest national security level possible. Layers of tall black fencing flank the U.S. Capitol complex in a stark reminder of what happened on January 6 four years ago.

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The day’s return to a U.S. tradition that launches the peaceful transfer of presidential power comes with an asterisk as Trump prepares to take office in two weeks with a revived sense of authority.

He denies that he lost four years ago, muses about staying beyond the Constitution’s two-term White House limit and promises to pardon some of the more than 1,250 people who’ve pleaded guilty or were convicted of crimes for the Capitol siege.

And he commended Vice President Kamala Harris for her role certifying her rival’s win.

He wrote on X that, “The peaceful transfer of power is the hallmark of our democracy” and that, “today, members of both parties in the House and Senate along with the vice president certified the election of our new president and vice president without controversy or objection.”

He also congratulated Trump on his win.

She passed copies of each state’s results to lawmakers, who read them out loud. When they finished, Harris announced the final results, and smiled tightly as Republicans applauded Donald Trump’s victory.

The entire process lasted less than 30 minutes.

“The chair declares this joint session dissolved,” Harris said. “Thank you.”

After going through all the certificates for 50 states and D.C., Congress anticlimactically certified the 2024 election for Trump and Vance.

It happened with little fanfare with some members taking breaks from looking at the dais to check their phones or engage in conversations with their neighbors.

Harris ended it with the words: “The chair declares this joint session dissolved.”

She shook hands and kissed a few members on the cheek before being swept away.

Vice President Kamala Harris announced the tally as President-elect Donald Trump receiving 312 votes and Harris herself receiving 226 votes.

Her announcements of both received raucous cheers in the chamber.

When she announced Trump’s victory, she smiled tightly as Republicans gave a standing ovation.

Democrats who were trapped in the House gallery four years ago when Donald Trump’s supporters were trying to break down the doors to the chamber posed for a photo in the same spot ahead of this year’s Jan. 6 certification.

Washington Rep. Pramila Jayapal posted it on X and wrote “we will not forget.”

The vice president-elect sat calmly as the chamber clapped for the announcement that his home state cast its electoral votes for the Trump-Vance ticket.

As the results are announced, she stands with her hands clasped in front of her.

Lawmakers clapped after the reading of each state’s results.

The first state where electoral votes went to Vice President Kamala Harris and Tim Walz was California and received a round of applause from Democrats.

The electoral certificate for Georgia going to Trump and Vance received an outburst of cheers from a few members of the GOP delegation, including staunch Trump ally Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene.

He was greeted by Republican members. Vance will be in attendance as a senator as his and President-elect Donald Trump’s victory is certified by Congress.

Vice President Kamala Harris and members of the Senate were in tow.

It’s a reunion for many, including new senators Adam Schiff of California and Ruben Gallego of Arizona who were until last week members of the House.

But it’s unlikely there will be any voting Monday.

The only time Congress votes on the Electoral College results is when someone lodges a successful objection to a state’s result. With Democrats not challenging the results of this election, the session should proceed mainly as a counting exercise.

Congress voted twice on the results of the election in 2021, rejecting Republican challenges to President Joe Biden’s victories in Arizona and Pennsylvania.

Attendance on both sides of the aisle appears low after Washington received heavy snowfall overnight into Monday.

There was mild applause for Vice President Kamala Harris as she arrived on to the House floor to a flurry of empty seats.

Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer says it’s “shamefully, utterly outrageous” that President-elect Donald Trump is considering pardons for those who participated in the breach of the Capitol four years ago.

“It would send a message to the country and to the world that those who use force to get their way will not be punished,” said Schumer, as lawmakers gathered Monday to certify Trump’s victory in November’s presidential election.

Schumer paid tribute to law enforcement officers working at the Capitol four years ago and said pardoning the rioters would be reckless and an insult to the memory of those whose lives were lost in connection with that day.

As most of his colleagues deflected or wrote off the anniversary of the Jan 6 insurrection, Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, a moderate Pennsylvania Republican, honored the “remarkable courage and sacrifice” of the Capitol police “who defended the Capitol that day.”

“Their courage in the face of danger upheld the ideals of our nation and reminded us of the profound cost of defending freedom,” he wrote on the social media site X.

Rep. Mike Collins, R-Ga., described the riot that took place at the U.S. Capitol four years ago as “a self-guided, albeit unauthorized, tour of the U.S. Capitol building” and praised President Donald Trump’s vow to pardon rioters who stormed the Capitol that day on social media.

“Since then, hundreds of peaceful protestors have been hunted down, arrested, held in solitary confinement, and treated unjustly,” Collins wrote on X. “Thankfully, President Trump has announced that, on day one of his presidency, he will grant pardons to nonviolent defendants.”

More than 1,250 people have pleaded guilty or were convicted of crimes for the Capitol siege.

Collins’ statement downplayed the violence and disruption to the certification of the 2020 election four years ago. He described the armed mob as comprised of “thousands of peaceful grandmothers” in his post.

Collins was elected to Congress in the 2022 midterms and campaigned on false claims that President Joe Biden had stolen the 2020 election. He’s known for often posting controversial, ironic and hard right statements online.

The four year anniversary of the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol is being marked Monday by a number of congressional Democrats, including current and former leaders as Republicans remained mostly silent as they prepare to certify the election of the man who incited that very mob.

Rep. Nancy Pelosi, who was speaker when the insurrection happened, marked the occasion, saying the attack “shook our Republic to its core.”

“We must never forget the extraordinary courage of law enforcement officers on January 6th who stood in the breach and stared down the insurrectionists to protect the Capitol, the Congress and the Constitution,” the California lawmaker said in a statement.

Her successor, Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries echoed her sentiment, saying the “American people must never be allowed to the forget the events” of Jan. 6. He added that “history will always remember the attempted insurrection and we will never allow the violence that unfolded in plain sight to be whitewashed.”

Inside the Capitol, reminders of the violence are increasingly hard to find.

Scars on the walls have been repaired. Windows and doors broken by the rioters have been replaced. And there’s no plaque, display or remembrance of any kind.

In some ways, it’s like the insurrection of Jan. 6, 2021, that shook the foundations of American democracy, never happened.

▶Read more about how Jan. 6 is—and isn’t—being remembered

On the morning of the certification, the U.S. Capitol was covered in snow with roads blocked off for miles as police hoped for a quiet day in Congress.

At certain points, there were more officers than staff as many lawmakers were expected to be absent Monday due to the inclement weather. It’s a stark difference from what transpired four years ago today as lawmakers, staff and reporters hid from a violent mob that overtook the Capitol building, leaving mayhem in their wake.

President Joe Biden is decrying what he calls an “unrelenting effort” to downplay a mob of Donald Trump supporters overrunning the U.S. Capitol in an attempt to block certification of the 2020 election — seeking to contrast that day’s chaos with what he promises will be an orderly transition returning Trump to power for a second term.

In an opinion piece published Sunday in The Washington Post, Biden recalled Jan. 6, 2021, writing that “violent insurrectionists attacked the Capitol.”

“We should be proud that our democracy withstood this assault,” Biden wrote. “And we should be glad we will not see such a shameful attack again this year.”

▶Read more about Biden’s opinion piece

Under heavy security, lawmakers in the snowy Capitol will gather at 1 p.m. ET to count the electoral votes in the 2024 election and declare Donald Trump the winner.

The joint session, which takes place on Jan. 6 every four years, is the final step after the Electoral College meets in December to officially elect the winner of the White House.

At the center of the process are sealed electoral certificates from each state, which are brought into the House chamber in special mahogany boxes that are used for the occasion. Those same boxes were rushed to safety four years ago as rioters breached the Capitol.

Bipartisan representatives of both chambers will read the results out loud and do an official count. No challenges to the results are expected this year, which means the process should move quickly.

Vice President Kamala Harris, as president of the Senate, will preside over the session and certify her defeat to Trump.

Four years ago, then-President Donald Trump urged supporters to head to the Capitol to protest Congress’ certification of Democrat Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 election.

“Will be wild!” Trump promised on Twitter a few weeks before Jan. 6, 2021. And it was.

This year, the only turbulence preceding the quadrennial ratification of the presidential election resulted from House Republicans fighting among themselves over who should be speaker.

▶Read more on why the calm may be illusory

It’s the largest prosecution in Justice Department history — with reams of evidence, harrowing videos and hundreds of convictions of the rioters who stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Now Donald Trump’s return to power has thrown into question the future of the more than 1,500 federal cases brought over the last four years.

Jan. 6 trials, guilty pleas and sentencings have continued chugging along in Washington’s federal court despite Trump’s promise to pardon rioters, whom he’s called “political prisoners” and “hostages” he contends were treated too harshly.

In a statement Monday, Attorney General Merrick Garland said Justice Department prosecutors “have sought to hold accountable those criminally responsible for the January 6 attack on our democracy with unrelenting integrity.”

▶ Read more about Jan. 6 prosecutions

Vice President Kamala Harris on Monday is set to preside over the certification of her defeat to Donald Trump four years after he tried to stop the very process that will now return him to the White House.

In a video message, Harris described her role as a “sacred obligation” to ensure the peaceful transfer of power.

“As we have seen, our democracy can be fragile,” she said. “And it is up to each of us to stand up for our most cherished principles.”

Harris will be joining a short list of other vice presidents to oversee the ceremonial confirmation of their election loss as part of their role of presiding over the Senate. Richard Nixon did it after losing to John F. Kennedy in 1960. Al Gore followed suit when the U.S. Supreme Court tipped the 2000 election to George W. Bush.

▶ Read more about Vice President Kamala Harris

What’s unclear is if Jan. 6, 2021, was the anomaly, the year Americans violently attacked their own government, or if this year’s expected calm becomes the outlier. The U.S. is struggling to cope with its political and cultural differences at a time when democracy worldwide is threatened. Trump calls Jan. 6, 2021, a “day of love.”

“We should not be lulled into complacency,” said Ian Bassin, executive director of the cross-ideological nonprofit Protect Democracy.

He and others have warned that it’s historically unprecedented for U.S. voters to do what they did in November, reelecting Trump after he publicly refused to step aside last time. Returning to power an emboldened leader who’s demonstrated his unwillingness to give it up “is an unprecedentedly dangerous move for a free country to voluntarily take,” Bassin said.

The fourth anniversary of the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol has a new focus as lawmakers brace for the prospect that President-elect Donald Trump may soon pardon many of the more than 1,500 people charged with crimes for their actions related to the riot.

▶Read more about Trump’s promises to issue pardons

As Congress convenes during a winter storm to certify President-elect Donald Trump’s election, the legacy of Jan. 6 hangs over the proceedings with an extraordinary fact: The candidate who tried to overturn the previous election won this time and is legitimately returning to power.

Lawmakers will gather noontime Monday under the tightest national security level possible. Layers of tall black fencing flank the U.S. Capitol complex in a stark reminder of what happened four years ago, when a defeated Trump sent his mob to “fight like hell” in what became the most gruesome attack on the seat of American democracy in 200 years.

No violence, protests or even procedural objections in Congress are expected this time. Republicans from the highest levels of power who challenged the 2020 election results when Trump lost to Democrat Joe Biden have no qualms this year after he defeated Vice President Kamala Harris.

And Democrats frustrated by Trump’s 312-226 Electoral College victory nevertheless accept the choice of the American voters. Even the snowstorm barreling down on the region wasn’t expected to interfere with Jan. 6, the day set by law to certify the vote.

▶ Read more about what to expect today

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Jimmy Carter and the man he beat for president, Gerald Ford, got so tight after office that their friendship became a kind of buddy movie, complete with road trips that were never long enough because they had so much to gab about.

Carter did not get along nearly so well with the other living presidents. The outsider president was an outlier after his presidency, too.

Nevertheless, past and present occupants of the office will attend Carter’s state funeral this week in what could be the largest gathering of the presidents club since five attended Washington services for George H.W. Bush in December 2018.

As a member of that elite, informal club, Carter was uniquely positioned to do important work for his successors, whether Democrat or Republican. He achieved significant results at times, thanks to his public stature as a peacemaker, humanitarian and champion of democracy and his deep relationships with foreign leaders, troublemakers included.

But with Carter, you never knew when he’d go rogue. This was a man so self-confident, he described himself as “probably superior” to the other ex-presidents who were still knocking about. Ornery about taking orders, he could be invaluable to the man in office, exasperating, or both at once.

The others often bonded over “what an annoying cuss Carter could be,” Nancy Gibbs and Michael Duffy wrote in their book “The Presidents Club.”

“Carter was the driven, self-righteous, impatient perfectionist who united the other club members around what seemed like an eternal question: was Jimmy Carter worth the trouble?”

He was, in the mind of Randall Balmer, a Dartmouth College historian of religion and Carter’s rise to the presidency. Balmer points to the violence averted in the last hours before a U.S. invasion of Haiti in 1994, when Carter, to the benefit of Democratic President Bill Clinton and countless lives saved, brokered a deal with Haiti’s military coup leader to step aside and restore democracy.

“Any time you can avoid military conflict you score that as a win,” Balmer said.

Four years earlier, for the benefit of Republican President George H.W. Bush and the lives at stake in the region, Carter secured peace in Nicaragua at the brink of bloodshed when he persuaded the leftist leader Daniel Ortega to accept the electoral defeat that had so shocked the Sandinistas.

John Danforth, former Republican senator from Missouri, joined Carter on missions to lay the groundwork for the 1990 Nicaragua election and then monitor it. In the first, the Carter entourage came upon Ortega’s motorcade on a dusty road through the town of Rivas.

The two men retired to the backyard of the nearest house for an impromptu negotiation over the government trucks Carter wanted Ortega to send around the country to deliver election material.

“Often when we envision former presidents, the picture is distant, even stuffy: men in dark suits and neckties captured in formal poses as though engaged in deep thoughts,” Danforth wrote in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch in February 2023. “My picture of Carter is quite the contrary. He is in a back yard in Rivas. A crowing rooster is at his feet. An earnest expression is on his face. He’s not talking statecraft; he’s talking trucks.”

Yet he could infuriate those in power. Years after the U.S.-led Gulf War rolled back Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait, it emerged that Carter had lobbied U.N. Security Council members and foreign leaders to reject the elder Bush’s request to authorize the use of force.

After being mostly sidelined by the man who defeated him in 1980, Ronald Reagan, Carter was given several missions by Bush until the Gulf War episode, after which he was cut off, Gibbs and Duffy write.

His relationship with Clinton was limited and uneasy, bookended by Clinton’s reluctance to call on a figure who symbolized humiliating election defeat for Democrats and by Carter’s disapproval of Clinton’s behavior outside his marriage.

But after Clinton won the White House in 1992, he sent Carter to North Korea to take the measure of dictator Kim Il Sung. Clinton aides were livid when Carter went beyond his brief, engaging in an unauthorized negotiation with Kim and, what’s more, talking about it on TV.

But then, Carter was always a step apart from the rest. He was also one to wag a finger at the political establishment, if not to pulverize it like Donald Trump did.

In January 2009, President George W. Bush invited other members of the presidents club to the White House for lunch and Oval Office photos. Bush, his father, Clinton and President-elect Barack Obama are seen clustered in front of the Resolute Desk. Carter is conspicuously off to the side — outlying.

The images spoke volumes about Carter’s place in the club, Balmer said. “Jimmy Carter didn’t fit in with a lot of people. He was really an introvert, not somebody who warms up easily.”

If politics makes strange bedfellows, though, post-politics makes even stranger ones. The embedded hostilities of Democrat-versus-Republican can melt in the presidents club as former rivals become unlikely mates.

Except with Trump. Regardless of party, the club members disdained Trump in his first term, and he had no use for them.

When Carter turned 100 in October, Trump marked the occasion by declaring that Joe Biden is so bad a president that Carter must be “the happiest man because Carter is considered a brilliant president by comparison.”

Trump was more sober in response to Carter’s death, saying “the challenges Jimmy faced as president came at a pivotal time for our country and he did everything in his power to improve the lives of all Americans. For that, we all owe him a debt of gratitude.”

Democrat Lyndon Johnson leaned frequently on Republican predecessor Dwight Eisenhower, telling him “You’re the best chief of staff I’ve got.” On the night of John Kennedy’s assassination, LBJ sought Ike’s advice on what to say to Congress, adding: “I need you more than ever now.”

Reagan once pulled Clinton aside to tell him the military salute he was executing during the campaign was too lame for the presidency. He taught him how to make it snappy. Clinton in turn cherished his long and frequent phone calls with Richard Nixon, confiding in the disgraced but savvy Republican on foreign policy problems of the era.

Clinton also became close to the Republican he vanquished in 1992, joining the elder Bush in Maine for golf, zippy boat rides and nights by the sea.

More consequentially, the younger Bush asked his dad and Clinton to lead a fundraising mission for countries devastated by the 2004 tsunami, giving rise to a bipartisan pairing that pitched in on more endeavors, like Hurricane Katrina relief. “I just loved him,” Clinton said upon Bush’s death in 2018.

So, too, Obama and the younger Bush have teamed up on occasion and Bush enjoys an especially good-natured relationship with Michelle Obama.

But the Jimmy-Jerry friendship was one for the ages.

Carter took it as a point of pride when two historians, speaking separately at a commemoration of the 200th birthday of the White House, said his friendship with Ford was the most intensely personal between any two presidents in history.

Carter said it began in 1981, when the two were sent by Reagan to represent the U.S. at the funeral of Anwar Sadat, the assassinated Egyptian leader. Nixon was on the trip, too, somewhat awkwardly. The other two took to each other, commiserating over how tough it could be to raise money for a presidential library when you’ve been booted out of office.

They were both Navy men, had three sons, a strong religious faith that Ford was quieter about than Carter, and independent spouses who bonded as well. “The four of us learned to love each other,” Carter said.

Carter and Ford spoke regularly, teamed up as co-leaders on dozens of projects and decided together which events they’d attend and skip in tandem.

“When we were traveling somewhere in an automobile or airplane, we hated to reach our destination, because we enjoyed the private times that we had together,” Carter said.

That’s what he told mourners in January 2007, at a service for Ford the month after he died at age 93.

The Democrat and the Republican he so cherished had made a pact, one hard to imagine in this time of partisan poison: Whoever died first would be eulogized by the other.

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