Four years after Trump supporters rioted at Capitol, lawmakers hope this Jan. 6 is peaceful

WASHINGTON – For the last four years, there's been a baseball bat propped up in a corner of Elissa Slotkin's office.

The Democrat from Michigan bought it after Jan. 6, 2021, when she found herself barricaded inside that office as a mob of Donald Trump's supporters roamed the U.S. Capitol, climbing in through smashed windows and doors, facing off with Capitol police officers and breaking into the abandoned House and Senate chambers, where lawmakers had been meeting to formalize the results of the 2020 presidential election.

Slotkin, a former House member who began her first term as a U.S. senator on Friday, recalled rushing into her office and frantically looking around for a weapon to defend herself and others, should the mob reach them, finding none.

"It's a day that is seared on my memory," she told USA TODAY. "It was an extremely dark stain on our country's history."

Congress worked until the early hours of the morning on Jan. 7 to certify Joe Biden's win in the 2020 election. When they returned to session after the riot, some Republican lawmakers moved to overturn the election results in key swing states, but their colleagues rejected those objections.

On Monday, lawmakers will finalize the results of a presidential election for the first time since the attempted insurrection. This time, lawmakers will be overseeing the certification of Trump's return to power in a session led by his opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris.

But unlike Jan. 6, 2021, lawmakers on both sides of the aisle told USA TODAY they expect Jan. 6, 2025, to be uneventful.

"Jan. 6 is going to be nice and calm," said Rep. Troy Nehls, R-Texas, an avid supporter of the president-elect. He said he doesn't expect Democrats to oppose the results as Republicans did in 2021.

"It's not going to happen again. I think you're going to see peace," Nehls said. "Everybody's got a smile on the face. Trump is coming back. Everybody's happy."

Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., told USA TODAY he was in the Senate chamber four years ago when his twin brother, retired astronaut Scott Kelly, texted him that Trump's supporters were scaling the side of the building.

Shortly afterward, "we could hear that – we could hear the noise of people in the Capitol." He was sitting next to Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., and the pair could tell rioters had gotten inside the building from the sound.

This time, Kelly said he also thinks the day will "go rather smoothly."

"There were a lot of people who participated in the mayhem which realized that that was a mistake, and I think we'll certainly be better prepared if anything was to go sideways," Kelly said. "But what we want to see is a peaceful transition of power."

The ceremony that takes place in Congress every four years on Jan. 6 is the final step in the Electoral College process.

The 2021 version was unusual in every respect, leading to Trump's second impeachment by the House and a historic set of federal criminal charges against the former president that were later dropped upon his election as president in 2024. It also continues to echo as Trump prepares to return as president promising to consider pardons for some of the more than 1,000 people who have been sentenced in the Capitol attack that injured 140 police officers.

Here's how things are set to work this time around: The Electoral College electors were chosen by each state on Election Day 2024, and the governor of each state later sent a list of electors to the federal archivist. Electors met to cast their votes in each state in December.

Certificates of those votes are then sent to the President of the Senate – also known for purposes of this Jan. 6 as Harris.

On Monday, the House and Senate will come together in a joint session to open and read those certificates as dictated by the 12th Amendment to the Constitution. Each state's certificates are read alphabetically by state, starting with Alabama and ending with Wyoming. As each state is read out, lawmakers can object to the certificate.

That process was changed through the 2022 Electoral Count Reform Act, which raised the threshold for objection from just one senator and House member to 20% of each chamber of Congress – making it significantly harder for lawmakers to repeat the 2021 attempt to overturn the election results.

That law also clarified that the vice president does not have the power to accept or reject electors, and required Congress to accept only one official certificate of electors from states. The move came after Trump called on Pence to step in during the 2021 certification process, a power the former vice president insists he never held.

Neither party expects fireworks this year. The presidential election is expected to be finalized smoothly on Monday afternoon once the results are read, and Trump will prepare to be inaugurated on Jan. 20.

"The lingering memories that we have of the last Jan. 6 transition of power will certainly come back on this day. We all remember the searing scenes of rioters in the Capitol, the sounds and sights of that insurrection," said Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn. "It will be a sober day, but my hope is (it will be) uneventful."

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: What to expect Jan. 6 when Congress meets to certify Trump's victory