Maryland Rep. Steny Hoyer announced this week he will attend President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration on Friday.
The veteran 5th District congressman — who represents areas of Prince George’s County along with the University of Maryland — is attending “as a sign of respect to the peaceful transition of power,” wrote Annaliese Davis, Hoyer’s press secretary, in an email on Wednesday.
Gov. Larry Hogan will also be at the inauguration, according to the Baltimore Sun.
Other Maryland members of Congress, however, have chosen to skip Friday’s event. Reps. Anthony Brown and Jamie Raskin have joined more than 60 Democratic lawmakers who said they will not attend Trump’s inauguration.
Brown, a first-term congressman for this state’s 4th District, announced Monday afternoon on Twitter that he will skip the inauguration, citing Trump’s tweets over the weekend questioning civil rights leader Rep. John Lewis’ effectiveness as a congressman as one reason.
Lewis, who emerged as a leader during the 1960s civil rights movement, is a “civil rights hero,” Brown tweeted. Lewis helped lead a civil rights march across Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama — remembered as “Bloody Sunday” — in 1965. State troopers attacked those marching and fractured Lewis’ skull during the protest.
Skipping Inauguration.@RepJohnLewis a civil rights hero. Enormous responsibility to be POTUS.I respect the office, can’t tolerate disrespect
— Anthony G. Brown (@AnthonyBrownMD4) January 16, 2017
Raskin, a representative for this state’s 8th District, also announced that he would not attend Trump’s inauguration in a statement Monday.
The congressman initially said Sunday he would attend the inauguration as a “constitutional duty to be there,” according to Bethesda Magazine. However, in his followup statement he cited Trump’s business conflicts in other countries, reluctance to blame Russia for election hacking and disparaging statements toward Lewis as his reasons for not attending.
“I cannot risk my presence at his inauguration being interpreted as any kind of endorsement of the normality of our situation,” Raskin said in a news release.
Lewis told NBC’s Meet the Press on Friday that he would not attend Trump’s inauguration and does not see Trump as a legitimate president. Trump tweeted on Saturday in response that Lewis is all “talk, talk, talk,” adding that the 5th District congressman from Georgia should “finally focus on the burning and crime infested inner-cities of the U.S.”
Congressman John Lewis should finally focus on the burning and crime infested inner-cities of the U.S. I can use all the help I can get! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 15, 2017