Good morning, it’s Wednesday.
I’m not sure about you, but it feels to me like a million years have passed since President Donald Trump was sworn into office for the second time on January 20. So much as happened since then, and I’m not even going to try to enumerate it all.
January 20 feels kind of late in the year for a newly-elected president to get started in what is one of the world’s most powerful – and complex – political gigs. The mayor of New York City celebrates their public inauguration on January 1, by contrast, which seems appropriate – new year, new mayor, that kind of thing.
Once upon a time, not too terribly long ago, actually, Inauguration Day was held even later in the year – on March 4, which also happens to be today. (Similar to the modern-day rule, if that day happened to fall on a Sunday, the ceremony was delayed until the next day, March 5).
March 4 was chosen to allow for the November election results to be fully tallied and sent to the capital. This was long before computers, telephones, text messages, etc. So the founding fathers had to build in a cushion of time to account for travel.
The March 4 date was put in effect for George Washington’s second inauguration in 1793. His first occurred on April 20, 1789, and was delayed in part because a very harsh winter made travel exceedingly difficult.
It wasn’t until April 6 that a sufficient number of members of Congress were able to make it to New York to tally up the electors’ votes and declare Washington the winner. Then it took a few MORE days for news of his win to reach Washington at his home in Virginia. He then made his way to New York City, where he was sworn into office on the balcony of Federal Hall, on Wall Street.
It wasn’t until 1933 and the ratification of the so-called “Lame Duck Amendment” (the 10th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution) that the inauguration date was moved from March to January, with the goal of reducing the transition time between outgoing and incoming administrations.
The amendment also set January 3 as the start date of terms for senators and House members and established that the vice president would assume the presidency if the president-elect dies before their term begins.
The change came in the middle of FDR’s first and second terms, so he was sworn in for the first on March 4, 1933 and January 20, 1937 for the second.
Side note: FDR is the longest-serving president and the only one to get elected four times. He broke precedent when he sought and won a third term in 1940. (Washington and every other president after him had self-limited to two, four-year terms only. Two years after FDR died at the age of 63 before finishing out his fourth term, lawmakers decided they needed to set term limits on the Oval Office and did so by passing the 22nd Amendment.
Of course, we know a certain president currently serving in the White House has been flirting with the idea of a third term, though in his more lucid moments, he has acknowledged that there’s really no legal argument he could make to bypass the Constitution.
These days, the so-called “Old” Inauguration Day usually passes by without so much as a mention – except for int his space, of course, where we are very big on obscure historical references. Fats less obscure is the fact that today is also Holi, the Hindu festival that is more colloquially known as the “Festival of Colors” or “Festival of Love,” marking the arrival of spring and the triumph of good over evil.
There are a number of Holi celebrations planned around New York in the coming weekend, since the holiday falls mid-week this year, which is not terribly condusive to
From the ridiculous to the semi-sublime is where we find ourselves in the weather department. Whereas yesterday brought snow and freezing rain, today’s forecast calls for sunny skies and temperatures rising into the high 40s. There will be areas of patchy fog in the morning, though, so be on the lookout for that.
In the headlines…
The Pentagon released the names of four U.S. troops who were killed by a drone attack in an opening salvo of strikes on U.S. military facilities amid President Trump’s widening war with Iran.
Speaking to reporters on Capitol Hill, ahead of classified briefings to the full Senate and House, Marco Rubio attempted to backtrack on his comments that a plan from Israel to attack Iran spurred the Trump administration to take preemptive strikes.
Trump for the first time acknowledged a personal dimension to his decision to attack Iran, citing the country’s efforts to assassinate him in 2024 as a factor in ordering the joint U.S.-Israeli operation that killed Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
The State Department ordered the mandatory departure of nonemergency personnel and family members in six countries in the Middle East over growing security concerns after two Iranian drones struck the U.S. Embassy in Saudi Arabia.
A divided Congress is deeply split over the Trump administration’s large-scale military campaign against Iran on the eve of a Senate vote on the matter, after Trump and top officials have offered a head-snapping series of shifting justifications for the conflict.
U.S. stocks tumbled and energy prices soared yesterday as fears spread through global markets that the Iran war may bring prolonged disruption.
The senior clerics responsible for selecting Iran’s next supreme leader met yesterday to deliberate, and the son of the slain former leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, reportedly emerged as the clear front-runner.
Prices at the gas pump jumped an average of 11 cents across the US yesterday morning, according to AAA. The national price for a gallon of regular gas climbed from $3.00 on Monday to $3.11 on Tuesday, while premium fuel rose from $3.86 to $3.98.
The United States and Ecuador have launched joint military operations against “designated terrorist organizations” in the South American country, the Pentagon said.
Voters in Texas, North Carolina and Arkansas headed to the polls yesterday to kick start the midterm cycle. Texas held competitive primaries for Senate, state attorney general and several House districts, which included a few awkward Democratic matchups.
The 2026 campaign kicked off with high-profile primary elections in Texas, where GOP Sen. John Cornyn is heading toward a runoff vote against state AG Ken Paxton. Democrats chose state Rep. James Talarico over U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett to be their candidate.
Republican gubernatorial nominee Bruce Blakeman called Gov. Kathy Hochul “un-American” for making contradictory statements about the US strikes against Iran.
Hochul maintains a significant, though slightly diminished, lead over Blakeman in the latest Siena University poll released this morning.
By a 54-29% margin, New York voters support the governor and Legislature allowing New York City to raise personal income taxes on City residents earning at least $1 million. New York City voters, 62-21%, and Democrats, 72-13%, overwhelmingly support it.
Blakeman formed a band of special deputies. A lawsuit calls the unit’s members unqualified and says that some appear to have arrest records.
Federal Medicaid czar Dr. Mehmet Oz is turning up the heat on Hochul, launching an investigation into the state’s massive $124 billion Medicaid program – which he has claimed is rife with waste, fraud and abuse.
Democrats in the state Senate and Assembly will formally propose higher income tax rates for wealthy New Yorkers in their respective one-house budget resolutions, putting them at odds with Hochul’s stance against tax hikes.
President Trump’s effort to stop the MTA’s congestion pricing program fell flat yesterday after a federal judge ruled the U.S. Department of Transportation’s attempt to kill the tolls was unlawful.
Judge Lewis Liman found that US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy’s move to unilaterally scrap the first-in-the-nation tolls, via a series of letters sent to Hochul in 2025, wasn’t legal under the agreement signed by the state and federal government years earlier.
Bill Magnarelli has represented Syracuse in the state Assembly for nearly 30 years. Now he’s facing a primary challenge from a county lawmaker who says Magnarelli hasn’t done enough for transportation in his hometown.
State lawmakers want to create a new state entity to perform independent autopsies of incarcerated people and reduce unexplained deaths in New York prisons and jails.
Neighborhoods in Manhattan, the Bronx, Brooklyn, and Queens will be the first to get free seats for 2-year-olds this fall, Mayor Zohran Mamdani and Hochul announced.
The first 2,000 seats in the program, known as 2-K, will be distributed across a diverse set of largely — but not exclusively — low-income parts of the city in four of the five boroughs and will be available this fall.
Taxpayers will shell out more than $36,000 per tot for Mamdani’s free 2-K pilot program – roughly $13,000 more than the average cost of private child care, city officials acknowledged.
Neither the mayor’s office nor the Department of Education responded to requests for comment about why Staten Island was left off the initial rollout or when locals should expect any kind of inclusion in the cornerstone project of Mamdani’s first year in office.
Mamdani continued to condemn the U.S. and Israel’s military strikes on Iran, while acknowledging the brutality of the Iranian government’s regime after initially declining to do so.
Mamdani may not be a fan of what he’s called an “illegal war of aggression” on Iran, but he stressed that his criticism of the joint U.S./Israel air strikes should not be confused with a defense of the oppressive regime.
Mamdani called right-wing radio host Sid Rosenberg’s remarks bigoted and “dehumanizing”, after the personality called him a “Jew-hating cockroach” a day earlier.
Rosenberg’s broadside drew swift condemnations from New York’s top Democrats, including Hochul, state Attorney General Letitia James and U.S. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.
President Trump shared a photo of Mamdani standing next to the Declaration of Independence in the Oval Office, the latest turn in their unique relationship.
Trump posted the photo of Mamdani lightly smiling next to a framed copy of the document to his Truth Social platform, adding: “Zohran has come a long way embracing, of course, the Declaration of Independence while at The Oval Office — Big progress!”
Mamdani’s administration admitted that an additional seven New Yorkers froze to death indoors — bringing the tally of fatalities from the recent stretch of frigid weather to 29.
New York City Transportation Commissioner Mike Flynn waffled when asked whether he’d make good Mamdani’s promise to aggressively add more bike and bus lanes across the five boroughs.
Flynn faced questions from the City Council at a hearing on New York City’s streets master plan, which requires the City to build 150 miles of protected bus lanes and 250 miles of protected bike lanes over five years.
The city’s woeful attempts to expand the number of lanes reserved for buses and bicycles earned failing grades from members of the City Council.
Property owners who failed to clear snowy sidewalks after two major winter storms in a month faced a blizzard of criticism at a City Council hearing from people with disabilities who were then marooned at home.
The city’s education department announced it’s backing off a plan to close a small Upper West Side middle school next year after a parent’s racist comment during a public meeting grabbed headlines and prompted widespread condemnation.
New York City consumer protection officials are putting hundreds of tow truck companies on notice, warning they’ll swiftly revoke licenses from operators that rip off drivers.
Judge Gerald Lebovits ruled on Friday that the manner in which Columbia had issued punishments to demonstrators who had taken over Hamilton Hall in 2024 was “arbitrary and capricious,” violating university rules and state law.
More than 600 vacant NYCHA apartments were taken over by squatters over the last few years as the number of empty public housing units spiked, a frustrating trend for the 165,000 applicants stalled on the authority’s waiting list.
Public housing vacancies in the city doubled to over 6,700 between January 2022 and May 2025, according to the Department of Investigation, posing safety risks to residents.
Manhattan Democratic Rep. Dan Goldman has argued that his stance on Israel is nuanced and consistent with progressive values. But some opponents hope to undermine that claim by pointing to his wife’s social media activity.
Eric Ulrich, a former Republican New York City Council member and former commissioner in Mayor Eric Adams’ administration, will face trial in September, three years after being indicted on bribery and conspiracy charges.
The New York attorney general is investigating Columbia University for its handling of allegations against Robert Hadden, a former university gynecologist who continued to work at one of its hospitals for weeks after his 2012 arrest on sex crimes.
Crashes continued to be reported yesterday evening in the Capital Region and Hudson Valley as ongoing snow and freezing precipitation have made the evening commute treacherous on slushy roads.
The Saratoga Springs City Council has agreed to vote on preserving its right to appeal a Feb. 18 state Supreme Court decision that ordered city lawmakers to re-vote on its denial to pay legal fees for a former commissioner of public works.
Vito Caselnova, a former Vermont sheriff’s deputy who was once charged with attempted murder, assault and other crimes tied to a Broadway shootout with police, was sentenced to a year of probation for his guilty plea to a misdemeanor weapons charge.
Thrift shoppers were in for a real hoot last month when a live owl was found nestled among antiques at an indoor flea market in East Durham. After contacting State Police, DEC Officer Darren Milliron was called and netted the sleepy bird with ease.
Lawsuits tied to a disputed contractor payment were dropped earlier this year, but not before the Town of Clifton Park incurred an additional $42,000 in costs to resolve the matter.
A City of Watervliet teenager who was jailed over the weekend on hate crimes charges before being released yesterday because he was a juvenile was returned to custody later in the afternoon, even as questions about his age remain under investigation.
Communications to and from the Albany Common Council over the past two weeks about the state of the city’s beleaguered Community Police Review Board paint wildly different pictures of the independent law enforcement oversight body.
Photo credit: George Fazio.
