Trump at 250th anniversary: US launched by England’s ‘big surrender’

Donald Trump took to the stage on the National Mall in Washington, DC, to deliver a “campaign-style speech” at the event which was delayed by a severe weather system. During his address, Trump looked back to the Revolutionary War, taking a swipe at England – then one of the world’s dominant powers – and claiming it was forced into a “big surrender” that launched the United States. He then shifted to modern politics and firmly rejected communism, stating that communists “haven’t got a chance” because they are not wanted in the country. He concluded by praising the “immortal patriots of 1776,” vowing that America would always remain the bravest, best, and most dominant nation on Earth. Earlier, thousands were evacuated as a safety precaution as heavy rain, lightning and damaging winds threatened temporary stages, fairground structures and screens erected for Trump’s address. People following evacuation orders due to thunderstorms in the area during the “Salute to America” Independence Day celebration on the National Mall (Photo: Alex Wroblewski/AFP via Getty Images) Trump was adamant that his speech would go ahead, saying in a Truth Social post: “America, it’s time to celebrate. Rain or shine, the American people deserve a celebration worthy of our nation’s 250th birthday.” He added: “For 250 years, Americans have overcome every challenge with grit, resilience, and determination. A little rain will never diminish our pride, our patriotism.” Donald Trump has turned the National Mall into a giant State Fair for 4 July, but few Americans want to celebrate with him. (Photo: Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP) America’s favourite national holiday is usually marked with fireworks, hot dogs and the proud flying of the Stars and Stripes as patriotic citizens belt out “The Star-Spangled Banner” in its honour. Donald Trump’s idea to celebrate the Semiquincentennial by turning the National Mall into a massive version of a homely state fair, complete with fairground rides and lemonade stands, must have sounded like a great idea when it was first suggested. The reality, even before severe thunderstorms forced a total evacuation of the site, had proved far less successful. Pictures from the event prior to the storm appear to show attendance far lower than the 45,000 Trump boasted about yesterday, with swathes of green space between people. While the volatile weather provided a dramatic delay to celebrations, analysts say the apparent flop began well before the first lightning strike. The low turnout is not just down to poor planning or the elements, but speaks to Trump’s deeper misunderstanding of the people he leads, and their feelings towards both him and the state of their nation. People on the grass at the The Great American State Fair after it was reopened following an earlier closure due to extreme temperatures on 3 July in Washington, DC. (Photo: Alexi J. Rosenfeld/Getty Images) Wrong day for it Part of the reason the events might have been poorly attended is that they are just the latest in a long string of celebrations Trump and others have organised for the nation’s 250th anniversary, according to Professor Emma Long, associate professor in American history and politics at the University of East Anglia. “Trump’s a narcissist. We’ve seen it right from the start,” said Long. “You can see it with the way he’s trying to stamp himself all over Washington DC, from the talk about putting an arch up in his name, to the demolition of part of the White House, to putting his name on the Kennedy centre. This is all about the sort of trying to get public recognition for himself.” Most recently, he announced a limited-edition passport with his face on it would be issued to Americans today, and talk of him putting his likeness on a $250 bill or coin abounds. A worker shades himself with an umbrella during a period of extreme heat at an entrance to The Great American State Fair on 1 July (Photo: Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters) This is not helped by the fact that Trump set up his own body to co-ordinate celebrations, ‘Freedom 250’, when Congress was already in the process of planning events under the ‘America 250’ banner. Freedom 250 said the evening will feature military flyovers and “the largest fireworks show in history” with 850,000 pyrotechnics exploding over 35 minutes. “The US has been celebrating the 250th anniversary on and off for quite some time at thispoint,” Long said. “A lot of states have had local events to celebrate the national moment.” That’s not to mention Trump’s own celebrations, including the UFC cage fight organised to coincide with his 80th birthday last month. Long thinks Trump got it wrong trying to hold a celebration today, as most Americans prefer to treat 4 July itself as a “get-together with family and friends” rather than travelling to a public event. The South Lawn of the White House was turned into a cage-fighting arena for the “UFC Freedom 250” event (Photo: Kent Nishimura / AFP via Getty Images) Far from the Maga crowds People may also have been put off attending by the location in Washington, DC, which is full of mostly “liberal” voters who wouldn’t be on board with a Trumpian celebration, Long said. She said things might have been different if he had held the event “somewhere in the middle of Texas or in parts of Florida or rural Ohio”. The Great American State Fair was temporarily closed due to heat on the National Mall yesterday. (Photo: Cheney Orr/Reuters) “Washington, DC is also an expensive city to stay in, even when you haven’t got all this going on,” she said. Those who have attended the fair have reported high prices, with lemonade at $9 and a turkey leg for $23, at a time when gas prices are at the highest on average since 2022. Some states even refused to have a stall due to the participation costs. “For Americans feeling the cost of living crisis, the impact of inflation around gas prices with everything going on in Iran, it may be that actually even just the cost…may well have have just put it beyond the reach of a lot of people,” she said. This is just the latest in a series of expensive Trump projects which have gone down poorly with struggling Americans, including his $14.7m (£11m) failed project to restore the White House reflecting pool. It didn’t help that heatwave meant travelling to the capital was even less attractive than it might otherwise have been, with attendees reportedly fainting yesterday forcing the closure of the fair for the afternoon and leading to the cancellation of today’s military parade. Trump’s popularity has ‘plummeted’ Others will have been kept away by political constraints rather than practical ones, Long argued. In other periods, people have put politics aside for the national holiday, Long said, so it speaks to the significance of Trump’s “plummeting” approval ratings that people weren’t even to set their differences aside and show up to his celebrations today. Attendees wait in line at the Florida booth during the Great American State Fair on the National Mall in Washington, DC, United States, on 2 July (Photo: Nathan Posner/Anadolu via Getty Images) “I saw this with people who were upset with George W. Bush at the beginning of the century when people were upset about some of his policies in Afghanistan and Iraq,” she said. “A lot of people were willing to put aside the politics and think, well, this isn’t about our government… It’s separate.” The recent Supreme Court decision upholding the right to birthright citizenship was widely welcomed, with the majority of Americans opposing Trump’s proposal to end it, suggesting Trump misjudged the American people’s attitude when it comes to the Constitution. “They have a reverence for these founding documents and their founding history that is akin to religion in many ways,” Long explained. “I think many people look at it and go, ‘Well, it’s in the Constitution, and we don’t mess around with that, so we don’t like it when Trump does that’.” Using pagaentry for politics At a rally-style event the night before the 250th celebrations, Trump also brought up his new divisive political rhetoric in a speech, conflating his anti-immigration stance with an anti-communist angle. Air Force One performed a flyover over the National Mall as part of celebrations yesterday. (Photo: Ken Cedeno/Reuters) “As we approach this magnificent anniversary, we see our American identity under a renewed attack,” he said to a crowd of supporters. “A generation after we fought and won the cold war against the menace of communism, there is now a resurgence of the communist menace in our land, including from newcomers to our country who embrace ideas totally opposed to our way of life and our great success.” Long thinks the escalating divisive rhetoric of the speech is a sign that Trump is responding to his drop in popularity, as reflected in the fair’s attendance, and of his fears that growing “Republican, ordinary voter criticism” might be reflected in the midterms. “If he feels like they are dropping off, I can see this as a way of … trying to to appeal to that group … and bring them back within the Maga fold,” she said. “He’s never going to admit that he made mistakes, but it might be a way of sort of saying, ‘Okay, we know things maybe aren’t quite going as we wanted, but look how bad it could get if you go with the other side’.” A piece of the new blue paint peels off from the bottom of the Lincoln Memorial’s Reflecting Pool on 18 June. The algae levels also spiked days after the renovation, which cost around $14m, was completed. (Photo: Christine Kao/The Washington Post via Getty Images)