01/20/2025 with Host Jim Falk

Published January 21, 2025 at 1:34 PM MST

A Presidential inaugural is about as important and complex of any event imaginable. Requiring the highest security, parades, dinners and balls. All centered around the transfer of power symbolized by the President-Elect taking the Oath of Office as required in Article II of the U.S. Constitution.

On this special Inaugural show, hosts Jim Falk and Peter Smith have a lively conversation with: Ambassador Jeanne Johnson Phillips, the executive director of George W. Bush’s 2001 inaugural and chairman of his 2005 inaugural committees; Benedicte Valentiner, the general manager of Blair House (the guest house where presidents-elect and their families spend the night prior to moving across the street to the White House) and presidential historian at the University of Texas at Austin, Professor Jeremi Suri. Ned Price, who served in several high-level positions in the Biden administration shares his perspective on what it is like coming in and leaving an administration. Some surprising historical footnotes from past inaugurals are also discussed including Robert Frost’s reading of “The Gift Outright.”