There was a lot different than what happened 4 years ago for many reasons, including the fact
that there were no objections, which is not typically something that you see.
Well, uh, the objections, there had been a few objections in years prior to January 6th, but,
um, the big thing is that this year there wasn't the cascade of objections that there was
on January 6th, and it went just as usual. It's a, it's a sort of a ritual of
democracy. It was uninterrupted. This is the way it usually is like a short, um, joint
session, and the result is usually foreordained.
Well, of course the result was pretty clear this time. No one was contesting it ultimately.
Mike, but just talk about the kind of the visual of Kamala Harris certifying her own
defeat like that and what that symbolizes for American democracy, and that is a part of
American democracy that, you know, has gone on for a long time. In fact, Mike Pence, one of
the things he said that he watched as he was trying to figure out what to do was he watched
Al Gore stand there and certify. His own defeat in the year 2000 when the election
was very bitterly contested and the Supreme Court intervened to stop the
counting in a way that a lot of Democrats thought were unfair nonetheless, Al Gore
just accepted the verdict of the courts and not only didn't protest it, but he like Kamala
Harris stood up there. Announced that his opponent won and declared that
the will of the people same thing Kamala Harris today I saw her with, you know, kind of
a, the Republicans started applauding when she announced the total that uh Trump received and
she kind of gave a tight lipped smile and a nod, um, and stood there like a vice president
and accepted the results that's their job and they did it. It also seems to be the job of
this administration to remind people of what happened 4 years ago, Mike, and I'm curious to
hear your thoughts on the media front that we saw today. Joe Biden, writing an op ed about
this in The Washington Post, talking about how it used to be a pro forma routine act and how
things changed, of course, that we will never take for granted, he said what happened. Uh,
after what happened 4 years ago, Kamala Harris actually produced a full video that was posted
on social media. She talked about her sacred obligation, all of this done in advance of the
certification today as Democrats clearly don't want to forget what happened 4 years ago. So I
think this is um serves two purposes one political and one kind of uh
preventive. Um, politically they want to contrast themselves as kind of fair-minded
people who accept the will of the people and sort of set up criticism for Trump if he
pardons the January 6th protesters as he seems likely to do, not just the protesters, but the
rioters and the people convicted of assaulting police and all of that. Um, so they're setting
up a political game here for Democrats, but also to the extent they are genuinely worried
about authoritative tendencies in the Trump administration, they're trying to set up an
insulation against. Authoritarian non-democratic moves by underscoring the
importance of these democratic norms and heightening and lifting them up. You also saw
that with the Medal of Freedom Awards to some of the people who investigated the January 6th
commission. All of that serves one, a pro-democratic preventative purpose and also a
partisan political purpose.