Four years ago, I wrote a story for this magazine about how Washington, DC might change with the election of Donald Trump. More steakhouses, I predicted, because of a right-wing penchant for red meat. The cosy wine bars of the Obama administration would give way to aggressively airconditioned sports bars; there’d be a revival of interest in stuffy, traditionally Republican enclaves of the city, like Georgetown, where popped collars, seersucker trousers and other hallmarks of the preppy class abound.
Many of the establishments in DC’s downtown that boarded themselves up for the election and inauguration have taken down the plywood, but the Capitol, White House and monuments on the Mall remain largely off-limits to pedestrians.Credit:Getty Images
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I was wrong. What happened instead was far grimmer. The expected boom in Republican-friendly restaurants never came. This was partly because the Trump administration chose not to fill a lot of political appointments in government, so there was never an influx of new residents to the city as there had been with past presidents. And it was also because Trump himself was not very interested in experiencing life in DC. Trump ate in just one restaurant the entire four years he was here: his own hotel’s steakhouse.
Then came the pandemic, mismanaged from the start. It’s estimated that one in four restaurants in DC will permanently close as a result. Then, the final nail in the coffin of a vibrant urban life: the domestic terrorists who, since the January 6 siege, continue to plot against the smooth functioning of national government.
I could never have predicted that one of the more lasting impacts of the Trump administration on the city would be a semi-permanent security apparatus around its pre-eminent symbols of democracy. Before this year, anyone could walk up to the Capitol – the people’s house – and take in its 30-metre rise, a fixture on the skyline like a cathedral atop a hill in Europe.
The building itself is no architectural wonder: as with the White House, it was conceived to serve a much smaller country, and two centuries of renovations and additions have left it a mishmash of styles. But it was an undeniable thrill to simply walk up its stairs, to look through the windows at the most powerful people in the land. It was a powerful symbol of accountability and transparency.
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Many of the establishments in DC’s downtown that boarded themselves up for the election and inauguration have taken down the plywood, but the Capitol, White House and monuments on the Mall remain largely off-limits to pedestrians.
This week, QAnon believers will again descend on the city because they are convinced Donald Trump is set to be sworn in as the rightful president. Rates at the Trump Hotel are more than $US1300 a night – three times what they normally are – and National Guard troops, decked out in camo, will reappear to police the streets and lend a war-torn vibe to the capital of the richest country in the world.