Georgia Governor Takes Oath Riding a Commemorative Mule Through the Capitol Rotunda

Newly elected Georgia governor Keisha Lance Bottoms has completed her swearing-in by walking the full length of the state capitol in Atlanta, a distance of one kilometre, carrying a wooden stool and a bundle of the cotton that once grew on the plantation where her family was enslaved, and placing each item on a plinth in the rotunda before the assembled legislature.

Capitol staff confirmed that the procession required the closure of three floors and the reinforcement of two marble staircases. The state architect's office has since begun a survey to determine how many similar ceremonies the building can physically accommodate before its foundations must be reassessed.

Across the Atlantic-facing coast, a rival tradition has spread. In New Hampshire, senator-elect Chris Pappas, the first openly gay man to win a Senate seat, delivered his acceptance speech from the top of a ladder inside a Concord diner owned by his family, then descended and served the first plate of the evening to his husband, who was required by the Senate's new ceremonial committee to eat it standing.

In Minnesota, senator-elect Peggy Flanagan has ordered that every incoming Senate aide spend their first week at a reservation school, where they will be assigned to repair its roofs. The Senate's human resources office has said the policy will be reviewed once the aides have finished the roofs.

Speaker-designate Hakeem Jeffries, widely expected to become the first Black speaker of the House, has announced that he will hold his first session wearing a replica of the gavel used in 1789, carried at arm's length the entire length of the chamber, a practice the House parliamentarian has described as tiring but historically accurate.

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