Donald Trump Inauguration Speech Will Be Short — Selfie Sticks, Coolers, Other Items Banned
At Donald Trump’s inauguration speech set for January 20, 2017, the president-elect is expected to take precautions. He plans to ban a list of items from being taken to the live event, and many of them make sense. Among these items are explosives and laser pointers, for obvious reasons.
Trump wants to eliminate the chance that he’ll be assassinated on his first day as President of the United States.
The possibility of such a thing happening has been rather strong, as when the 2016 election results came in, the Electoral College gave him the win. Even the recount ordered by former presidential hopeful Jill Stein didn’t change the fact, but instead actually cost more votes for Hillary Clinton. After riots in the streets, the president-elect isn’t taking any chances. He is also taking the needs of his supporters attending the speech into consideration.
The list of banned items from Donald Trump’s inauguration speech, according to the official website, is below.
- Aerosols
- Ammunition
- Animals other than service/guide animals
- Backpacks and bags exceeding size restrictions (18 inches by 13 by 7)
- Bicycles
- Balloons
- Coolers
- Drones and other unmanned aircraft systems
- Explosives
- Firearms
- Glass, thermal, or metal containers
- Laser pointers
- Mace / Pepper spray
- Packages
- Selfie Sticks
- Signs exceeding the size restrictions (20 inches by 3 by 1/4)
- Structures
- Supports for signs and placards
- Toy guns
- Weapons of any kind
- Any other items determined to be potential safety hazards
This list appears to indicate that Donald Trump is predicting some trouble at the event and will reduce the chances of anything possibly interrupting it. Containers and packages could easily be bombs, with glass ones potentially used to make Molotov cocktails. Toy guns could easily be real ones, with today’s 3D-printing technology. Mace and pepper spray could be used against supporters by protesters who are determined to cause trouble.
Signs over a certain size, as well as selfie sticks and balloons, could simply be deterrents from people further back in the crowd getting a full view.
CNN claims that Donald Trump is intentionally writing his own “short” speech due to it being an outdoor event in winter. Presidential historian Douglas Brinkley met with Trump on Wednesday to talk about the upcoming event, and the president-elect stated that he “doesn’t want people standing out in the cold.”
Historically, two things are taken into consideration in determining how the presidency will work. These things are the inauguration speech and the first 100 days in office. Franklyn D. Roosevelt set the 100-day standard in place, albeit by accident, and it’s been a predictive measure ever since. Often what a president accomplishes in those first three or so months determines the rest of the four to eight years — or less in the event of an assassination.
The inauguration speech is traditionally written for the president on his first day in the office, but again, Trump doesn’t want everybody standing in the cold too long and has decided to pen his own speech.
While some news sources such as Gizmodo’s Matt Novak have taken a decidedly Democratic angle on the list, claiming that Trump “hates freedom,” many of the items being banned from the inauguration speech are probably just standard security measures. It could very well be the same list (aside from drones and selfie sticks) used for Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, and even all the way back to Richard Nixon.
In fact, the list of banned items might have little to do with Donald Trump whatsoever.
[Feature Image by Gino Santa Maria/Shutterstock.com]
