Ohioans are headed to Washington, D.C., to witness the inauguration of president-elect Donald Trump or to march for women’s rights. The Beacon Journal is there for it all. Check back for updates throughout the weekend.
Buckeye red spotted
The red hats in the nation’s capitol are deceiving. Just about anywhere in Ohio, scarlet doesn’t usually carry a political campaign slogan.
That’s why the script Ohio blazed across Jonas Hoover’s baseball jacket was so unmistakable. The retiree, an Ohio State Buckeye’s fan, was strolling down Pennsylvania Avenue with his family, test-driving the route a celebratory parade would take in less than 24 hours when Donald Trump becomes the 45th president of the United States.
Hoover, and his wife, Alice, drove out to Washington D.C. on Wednesday, following their son-in-law Will Waidelich and his wife, Holly. The younger couple had taken their twin daughters in 2009 to witness the inauguration of President Barack Obama. It was, and always has been to them, about history.
The Hoovers and Waidelichs live in the Columbus suburb of Reynoldsburg.
“We just has such a great experience that we made these plans [for the 2017 inauguration] before we knew who was going to win,” Holly Waidelich said. “I expected [Hillary Clinton] to be president. I’m not going to tell you how I voted, but by what I heard in the media, I thought she was going to win.”
The twin daughters have now grown and were too busy raising their own families this year to travel to Washington D.C. for the family trip, which included a stop in Alexandria to visit a grandson in the military.
The Hoovers, who will continue south after the inauguration to snowbird in Florida for a couple months, couldn’t pass up the opportunity after their hero won the election.
Trump is a champion to them. He will return order and prosperity to America, they said, and “drain the swamp” of self-dealing they say has infested the nation’s capitol for too long.
“There are so many” reasons to support Trump, said Jonas Hoover, 74.
“I wouldn’t even know where to begin. Trump means to me law and order,” said the retired postal employee and salesman who once worked on a farm outside of Wooster.
“It’s patriotism. I think anybody should get behind the president,” he said, scoffing at Democratic leaders in Congress who have planned to boycott the ceremonial transition of power in the White House.
“To me, that’s not unpatriotic. It’s un-American,” he said.
The four walked along Pennsylvania Avenue with their backs to the Capital Building on an unseasonably warm winter day. Passing the Newseum, with the current front pages of every major newspaper in America on display in frames along the sidewalk, the family picked out place to watch the parade the next day. But they paid little attention to the headlines, which spoke often of Obama’s last press conference and how Trump’s cabinet picks endured scrutiny during Senate confirmation hearings.
The media, Alice Hoover said, has been dishonest all year, leading her to believe that Hillary Clinton had all but won the election before the votes were even cast or counted. “We watched all his rallies and wondered how the media could report what it did when the crowds were so big,” said Alice Hoover, as she and a sea of Trump fans and tourists continued east toward the White House.
Inauguration excitement
On ascent out of Akron-Canton Regional Airport, Andy Ogurchak leaned over to peer out the airplane window.
Inauguration bound, only a seatbelt could hold back his excitement in the early morning on the eve of the next presidency.
“I’m going to need to drink to fly with you,” joked his girlfriend, Lois Lindsey, who was somewhat nervous during takeoff.
Ogurchak attended his first presidential inauguration in 2012 at age 57.
“I didn’t know what to expect,” he reminisced while his girlfriend curled up for a nap beneath his coat. “There’s just so much activity. So much going on. You can go in any direction.”
Ogurchak works for a security firm in Akron. He lives near the University of Akron.
He had to take a couple days off work to attend the 2017 presidential inauguration, something he’s planned for four years.
But he’s not a political junkie, like many people boarding buses and planes for Washington, D.C., this weekend. In fact, he didn’t even vote in 2012.
“I didn’t like either one of them,” he said of his choices then: Barack Obama and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney.
This time, he voted for president-elect Donald Trump. And he can feel the change coming.
“He’s not one of the boys. I think it’s great,” Ogurchak said of Trump’s campaign promise to shake up business as usual in the federal government. “There’s more energy. This time, it’s upsetting a lot of apple carts.”
The Akron man had committed to fly to Washington with or without his candidate standing victorious on Friday, left hand on the Bible and right hand in the air as he solemnly takes the oath of office. To Ogurchak, it’s about anything but politics.
He criticizes the scores of Democrats who have fled the capital as hypocritical and uncooperative.
“How can you claim that we can work together when right out of the gate, you’re not?” he said.
“It’s for the office, not the person,” he said of witnessing history. “Respect. I think that’s lost today.”
Doug Livingston can be reached at 330-996-3792 or dlivingston@thebeaconjournal.com. Follow on Twitter: @ABJDoug .