DEMS/POLITICAL FIGURES/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “Democrats counted their New Year’s blessings on Wednesday [1-3-18] as two new senators — Doug Jones of Alabama and Tina Smith of Minnesota — joined their caucus, reshaping the balance of power in the Senate after a history-laden swearing-in ceremony attended by three current and former vice presidents.
The arrival of Mr. Jones, who replaced a Republican (Ms. Smith replaced a Democrat) alters the makeup of the Senate, giving Republicans a one-vote majority of 51 to 49. That could prove just enough to thwart much of President Trump’s legislative agenda.
It also provided the first tangible boost to Democratic power in Washington since the crushing and unexpected defeats of Election Day 2016, which many Democrats had believed would usher in a new Democratic president and a Democratic Senate…
The new senator told his supporters that his arrival in Washington was ‘the fulfillment of a dream for a long time.’
Rare are the moments of bipartisan comity in the Senate, but Wednesday’s ceremony offered one, however fleeting. It was the senators’ first day back at work after their holiday break — a time of ‘fresh starts and new mercies,’ as the Senate chaplain, Barry C. Black, said in his opening prayer at noon.
But the swearing-in of Mr. Jones and Ms. Smith almost certainly brought a measure of relief to senators in both parties. For Republicans, Senator Jones meant there would be no Senator Roy S. Moore, who faced accusations of child molestation and whose election would have been hung around each of their necks.”
-Sheryl Gay Stolberg, “Two Democrats Sworn In to Senate, Cutting the Republican Edge to One,” The New York Times online, Jan. 3, 2018