Pelosi elected to 4th term as House speaker

She’s the third speaker in the last 25 years to win with less than 218 votes.

President Donald Trump is slated to hand over control of the White House to President-elect Joe Biden in 17 days.


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McConnell welcomes new Senate

With all new senators having been sworn in, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell welcomed the new members on the Senate floor.

"To say the 117th congress convenes at a challenging time would indeed be an understatement. From political divisions to a deadly pandemic to adversaries around the world the hurdles before us are many and they are serious, but there are also plenty of reasons for hope," McConnell said.

The Senate also passed a series of administrative resolutions and standing orders for the new Congress -- including an agreement to Wednesday as a the date to count electoral votes. It's a date already set, but this formalizes it.

In his welcoming remarks, McConnell urged members to remember their oath to the Constitution.

"We gavel in today like 116 prior Senates have gaveled in before us with plenty of disagreements and policy differences among our ranks but all -- all swearing the same oath to support and defend the same Constitution," McConnell said. "All loving the same country and all of us committed to do what we can to leave behind an even stronger nation than the one we've been blessed to inherit."

The Senate stands adjourned until Wednesday.

-ABC News' Allison Pecorin


Rep. Gwen Moore participating in opening day just 6 days after testing positive for COVID-19

Wisconsin Democrat Rep. Gwen Moore will participate in Sunday’s opening day events –- including the House speaker’s vote, according to her office, after testing positive for COVID-19 just six days ago.

Republicans complained that her presence “certainly seems to be in violation of the (Office of the Attending Physician) quarantine guidance,” and wonder how it was safe for her to travel to Washington after her diagnosis.

A senior Democratic aide did not immediately respond to an inquiry questioning whether special accommodations were being made for Moore, whose office also has not yet answered inquiries regarding how she traveled to Washington following her infection.

One Democratic member, who said he received his first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine last Tuesday, told ABC News that he is “staying clear of everyone,” pivoting to observe that some Republicans are at the Capitol and not wearing masks.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi, whose path to the speakership is narrow with such a slim majority in the new Congress, will depend on Moore’s support to keep her position.

After opening the 117th Congress with the prayer and pledge, the House has initiated a quorum call to establish sufficient attendance ahead of the vote for speaker later in the afternoon. Lawmakers are appearing in groups of 72, arranged by alphabetical order of their last names.

-ABC News' John Parkinson and Benjamin Siegel


Senators being sworn in by vice president

The Senate floor is open and Vice President Mike Pence is presiding over the swearing in of the new Senate.

Senators are presenting themselves in pairs -- in alphabetical order and accompanied by the other senator who represents their state -- where a masked Pence is administering the oath to each pair. The first pair of senators sworn in, Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., and Shelly Moore-Capito, R-W.Va., each elbow bumped Pence after taking the oath.

The chamber appears almost entirely full and members are applauding after each administered oath.

The Senate will welcome six new members: Cynthia Lummis, R-Wyo., Ben Ray Lujan, D-N.M., John Hickenlooper, D-Colo,, Roger Marshall, R-Kan., and Bill Hagerty, R-Tenn. Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., was sworn in late last year.

Two Senate seats remain outstanding pending the Georgia runoff elections on Tuesday. Sen. Kelly Loeffler will maintain her seat because it was an appointment, but Sen. David Perdue's term expires as soon as the new members are sworn in.

-ABC News' Allison Pecorin


New Congress to meet at noon

The 117th session of Congress will begin with both chambers meeting at noon, as required by the Constitution.

New members of the House and Senate will be sworn in under unusual circumstances given the pandemic, with social distancing and fewer family members and supporters in attendance.

Because control of the Senate hinges on the Georgia Senate runoffs, Republicans will begin the new Congress with control of the chamber and a 51-seat majority. The seat of Sen. David Perdue, R-Ga., will be vacant until a winner is formally certified in Tuesday's runoff election.

Sunday afternoon, the House will elect a speaker.

Nancy Pelosi is expected to win with the narrowest of margins, given Democrats’ historically slim majority, but the vote is expected to take longer than last year because of the coronavirus precautions that require lawmakers to enter the chamber in waves.

-ABC News' Mariam Khan and Benjamin Siegel


Judge tosses suit against VP seeking reversal of election

A judge has tossed out Rep. Louie Gohmert's effort to overturn the results of the presidential election by forcing Vice President Mike Pence to override the electors when votes are finalized by Congress on Jan 6.

"The problem for Plaintiffs here is that they lack standing," Judge Jeremy Kernodle wrote in rejecting the case against Gohmert and several alternate Arizona electors Friday evening. "Plaintiff Louie Gohmert, the United States Representative for Texas’s First Congressional District, alleges at most an institutional injury to the House of Representatives. Under well settled Supreme Court authority, that is insufficient to support standing."

He also said that the intervening electors "allege an injury that is not fairly traceable" to the vice president.

Pence had argued that Gohmert should have sued the House and the Senate, not the vice president in his presiding role.


"The other Plaintiffs, the slate of Republican Presidential Electors for the State of Arizona (the “Nominee-Electors”), allege an injury that is not fairly traceable to the Defendant, the Vice President of the United States, and is unlikely to be redressed by the requested relief," Kernodle wrote.

Kernodle also wrote that Gohmert didn't allege any harm done to himself as an individual.

"He does not identify any injury to himself as an individual, but rather a 'wholly abstract and widely dispersed' institutional injury to the House of Representatives," the judge wrote.

Following the ruling, Gohmert and the alternate Arizona electors filed a notice of appeal to the Fifth Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals.

-ABC News' Meg Cunningham