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Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) said Sunday morning that the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies is planning for a normal inauguration ceremony, despite the spikes in coronavirus cases across the country in the past week. “The six-person committee — three senators, three House members — that I chair, we're moving forward anticipating an outside full-scale inauguration,” Blunt told George Stephanoplous on ABC’s “This Week.” (Bice, 11/8)

Joseph R. Biden Jr. is expected to be sworn in as the 46th commander in chief of the United States on Jan. 20 at an outdoor inauguration ceremony, though the coronavirus pandemic might cause the plans to be scaled back. “We are moving forward, anticipating an outside, full-scale inauguration,” Senator Roy Blunt, Republican of Missouri, said on Sunday on the ABC News program “This Week With George Stephanopoulos.” But Mr. Blunt, who chairs the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies, was still hedging about which candidate he expected to be placing his hand upon a Bible that day. (Diaz, 11/9)

But in pandemic-shaken Washington, the spectacles that looked improbable for political reasons now look difficult for epidemiological ones: It’s hard to imagine would-be spectators cramming into the Metro in order to jam the mall together. It’s harder to imagine party faithful crowding indoor event spaces for inaugural balls (or city regulators allowing such violations of quarantine rules). And, in the event of a transfer of power, it’s possibly hardest of all to imagine any two pols, let alone Donald Trump and Joe Biden, agreeing to coop themselves up in a bulletproof limo for the traditional ride to the Capitol. (Mullins, 11/3)