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The Feeling of Patriotism Is All In the Air, Sort Of
In his latest Freedom 250 triumph, Pres. Fragile Snowflake launched a Great American State Fair in D.C, which is not a state, boasting tens of attendees, no shade or seats, melted ice cream, busted Ferris wheel, $25 pretzels, teenage performers, sorry-ass pavilions often sporting a mere chair, a masturbating MAGA podcaster, and a Spinal-Tap-like mini-Arc-de-Pedo that began disintegrating its first day. No wonder headliner Trump - right again! - giddily proclaimed, "This is the beginning of the golden age of America."
Fresh from miraculously transforming the iconic "reflecting lakes" into a fetid debacle, Trump launched "the most unforgettable birthday party any country has ever had," though maybe not in the way he envisioned. Many observers noted "his own Potemkin Village," billed as "a world-class exposition," sadly "sputtered out of the gate," bathed in the same "stench of kitsch and failure" as everything he touches. The “sparsely attended and shockingly boring” result was variously likened to "comedy gold," "horror movie vibes," "theater of the absurd," and a Butlins - low-rent British package resorts - "for fascists with heatstroke."
It did not have to be this way. A viral Reddit post by a former worker at the Smithsonian recalled the "millions in private philanthropy" raised years ago for a landmark 250th anniversary of what's been called "the greatest sentence ever written" declaring "all men (sic) are created equal." Planned was a month-long folk festival, "The Festival of Festivals," featuring a blend of the likes of Burning Man, Farm Aid, Grand Ole Oprey and local festivals highlighting the best of American arts, redolent of the famed Christmas Truce of World War One when "people put down their weapons and got together" in a hopeful, unifying cause.
That was before Trump "stole America's 250th birthday and threw it for himself," refusing to issue permits for the Smithsonian's version and swiftly turning what could have been a joyful historic civic celebration into a bleak, gaudy reality-TV pageant, an alleged state fair (which clearly neither he nor his minions have ever seen) without the requisite rides, games, farm animals, cotton candy, fried dough, fresh lemonade or "fun," which could be why reports surfaced of a muggy and miserable scene where bored kids were loudly complaining and at least one took to rolling in the steamy grass screaming, "I. WANT. TO. GO. HOME!!!”
Because grifters gonna grift, it also became an egregious “$100-million laundering operation" with a small Ferris wheel. Added to $80 million in our money he stole from the bipartisan, real 250 commission, he lured corporate sponsors seeking favors or contracts - Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Palantir, Oracle, ExxonMobil, United Airlines - with obscene "deals": $500,000 for “V.I.P access and seating" at all events, $1 million for a “private thank you reception” and “historic photo opportunity,” $2.5 million to be handed the mike for "a speaking role" at a July 4 event," up to $10 million for God knows what further abuse of power.
Thus did his latest round of corrupt bombastic patriotism, trailing "a sense of dread" and blaring Creed's Higher, kick off Wednesday night to a military flyover, a National Anthem badly sung by Kash Patel's girlfriend, and a speech behind bulletproof glass to a mostly empty National Mall. "I am thrilled to declare that America is back,” he said, going on to reassure himself on the greatest terror of his life. "We were a joke two years ago, but nobody's laughing at us anymore" - this, from a purported US president forced to fill in for Milli Vanilli. Then he did his cringey robot "dance" while a Marine band played YMCA. Oof.
Despite a relatively, mercifully brief speech, a viral video showed people streaming out as he droned on. Later he posted the rally was "packed to the brim with 45,000 happy people. Everybody stayed right until the end of my speech - they loved hearing about a truly successful America." Uh huh. "The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears": Most reports put the crowd at about 1,000. Sleepy Joe last week: "Whoa. What a loser." Online, people cracked about "almost dozens of people," said they'd seen bigger crowds at school fairs, family reunions, Walmart, and suggested, "They were all at Mamdani's pool party."
Grimly smiling Fox News hosts, though, toughed it out. Before a vast vista of grass dotted with maybe 14 people, they posted AI slopaganda and happily exclaimed "How great is this?" "We've got thousands celebrating!" "People are still coming!" and, "The feeling of patriotism is all in the air!" After C-listers all bailed and Vanilla Ice cancelled due to non-existent "inclement weather," performers came down to a 14-year-old singer from Arkansas and a local artist who painted an American flag live on stage; steadfast Fox chirped "so many cool people" watched him. They didn't mention, per one sage, that more people have been sexually assaulted by Epstein et al than attended this week's Fair.
Meanwhile, generator issues caused the Ferris wheel to periodically shut down and the ice cream to melt; inexplicably, a butter sculpture of Trump and mascot cow named Melania didn't. Food vendors were few and airport-pricey: $5 water bottles, $23 turkey legs, $25 stuffed pretzels, a $27 dry burger with "limp, slimy lettuce on top.” Replicas of Trump passports, bewilderingly reading, "Welcome but be good," were gifted; invited whiteboard messages included, "A felon and predator resides at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave!!”; police arrested a MAGA podcaster dressed as Uncle Sam for masturbating to a performance by women acrobats.
Lining the Mall were slapdash, flimsy state pavilions looking like empty doctors' waiting rooms or "like something Wile E. Coyote would run into while chasing the Road Runner." Over 20% of states declined to partake in the regime's ideological project to rewrite American history into a white, male Christian saga; some sent a minimal token - state name or symbol, (welcome) chair or two. Maine is a bare room whose walls list lobster facts; Oregon, "the Beaver State," has a chair, Vermont was empty until a woman drove down with maple syrup pamphlets; Alabama has a tub of peanuts; Kansas, cut-outs of Wizard of Oz characters.
North Carolina flew a Confederate flag, later taken down. In "a small act of cultural sabotage," Florida honors anti-Trump Tom Petty and Jimmy Buffett among its famous residents. A mostly empty Faith and Family pavilion adorned with an Israeli flag hosted an evangelical pastor and drew two customers to "plunder hell and populate heaven”; other evangelicals reportedly wander the empty grounds, offering exorcisms. An empty War Department (sic) booth exhibits a cardboard cutout of George Washington, a montage of Hegseth's noble "war-fighters," and camo vests for kids to try on, get hyped and emulate them.
Overseeing it all stands a stubby, shabby plywood and vinyl mock-up of Trump’s $100 million “Arc de Trump,” aka "Arc de Mentia," "Epstein Memorial Arch," "L' Arc de Dômbfuqué," his "Triumph of the Will" vision of "democracy if it had a midlife crisis and bought a white tracksuit." Many liken it to McDonald's arches, Spinal Tap's mini-Stonehenge, or Derek Zoolander's Center for Kids Who Can't Read Good and Wanna Learn to Do Other Stuff Good Too," but the arch quickly began buckling and melting in D.C.'s humidity. Some fair-goers in search of rare shade have still sought it out. Others argue it'd get more traffic as a urinal.
- YouTube www.youtube.com
On Monday, the Fair was devoted to RFK's so-called MAHA, Make America Healthy Again program, or what has now morphed into Make America Hurl Again after organizers inexplicably decided the best way to promote better eating habits was to hold a contest in muggy-90-something-degree temps where people stuff their faces with as many pancakes as possible while gagging and trying not to throw up. Eat till you puke: Fun for the whole family! Up next, some speculate: "They will swim in some sewage and stare into an eclipse." Or mebbe snort heroin off a toilet seat? Stay classy, fascists. Trump was right: Too much winning.
America's 250th marks the signing by 56 brave men of "a flawed but aspirational document" declaring a nation's independence and asserting, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” Facts owe. Most of the Founding Fathers - slaveholders, misogynists, oppressors of Native Americans - "did not live up to those words," notes one historian. "The country they created was incomplete, and the work of completing it has been the work of every generation since."
Since its inception, America has been "wrestling with the contradictions of its original sin," says Eddie Glaude, a professor of African- American studies. "This divided soul in which America imagines itself as a beacon of freedom and as a white republic (is) a kind of madness at the heart of the country. That madness evidences itself in cycles, and we happen to be in one right now." Still, every bailed musical act, court victory, voice raised in truth tells Trump, "We see you," writes Dean Blundell. "The country is not him. It has never been him. The country is the people who showed up across 250 years and did the work." And for now, it remains.
Trump's Reflecting Pool Disaster Exposed as More Details Revealed on Firm That Won No-Bid Contract
New reports have revealed the full scope of President Donald Trump's disastrous renovation of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, which the National Park Service this week has been scrambling to clean up.
A Thursday report in The New York Times revealed that the firm tapped to install the pool's water purification system, Greenwater Services, was given a $1.7 million contract that "bypassed the competitive-bidding process that is typically required" for such projects.
Even though Greenwater had only received one other federal contract in the past, NPS said it bypassed the normal bidding process on the grounds that "there was no time to consider other offers because the system had to be installed in time for events celebrating the country’s 250th birthday," reported the Times.
The Times also found that Greenwater is owned by JJ Cafaro Investment Trust, whose owner is a Trump donor and "a neighbor to Mar-a-Lago, the president’s private club in Florida."
The firm's work has come under scrutiny in recent days after a massive algae bloom erupted in the pool, which prompted NPS workers to dump containers of hydrogen peroxide into the water, which had turned a fluorescent green.
As noted by the Times, the NPS refilled the pool before Greenwater had installed a permanent water purification system, which the paper wrote raised "the risk that it would quickly be clouded with algae."
While algae blooms have long been common in the Reflecting Pool, The Washington Post on Thursday commissioned expert analysis of satellite imagery and determined that this year's bloom was the largest to occur in the last five years and that "algae levels spiked days after Trump’s renovation was completed."
Alana Menendez, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Virginia’s Department of Environmental Sciences, told the Post that there was more algae in the Reflecting Pool on the first week after its reopening than in any other June satellite images of the pool going all the way back to 2021.
Algae blooms aren't the only problem facing the pool, as CNN reported on Thursday that some of the blue material that had been installed at the bottom of the pool as part of the renovation has started peeling off.
Specifically, CNN said that its reporters "observed a flap of blue material that was partially attached to the bottom in one area of the pool and floating toward the top," although the network added that "it is unclear if the material is paint or sealant, and it's unclear what caused it to come up."
Watchdog Warns Crypto Bill Could Be Major Tax Giveaway to Ultrarich—Including Trump Family
A government watchdog is warning that new cryptocurrency policies being considered in the House of Representatives would be a major boon to the ultrawealthy, including President Donald Trump's family.
In an analysis published on Monday, the Revolving Door Project (RDP) highlighted new crypto-related tax bills being discussed in the House Ways and Means Committee, including one that "would create a functional subsidy for cryptocurrency firms by allowing them to defer taxes owed on their mined coins indefinitely and without interest, so long as the firms do not sell the coins."
This would allow coin owners to raise money by borrowing against these assets without having paid a cent of taxes on them, the analysis explains, which could be particularly beneficial for Trump's two eldest sons.
"Eric and Donald Trump Jr. reportedly hold a 20% stake in the bitcoin mining firm American Bitcoin, which mined 817 bitcoin in Q1 of 2026 alone," RDP writes. "At current prices, this represents a value of more than $50 million, while the company has stated that it already intends to hold assets it mines. If passed, this loophole could mean millions of dollars in taxes owed by the Trump sons’ firm could be deferred endlessly."
RDP also published a list of crypto donations to lawmakers on the House Ways and Means Committee. Rep. Steven Horsford (D-Nev.) has received nearly $2 million in support from the industry since 2023, more than any other committee member.
Other top recipients of crypto cash include Reps. Tom Suozzi (D-NY), Jimmy Gomez (D-Calif.), Adrian Smith (R-Neb.), and Jason Smith (R-Mo.), chairman of the committee.
Jeff Hauser, executive director of RDP, said that the bills currently under consideration in the House are essentially a return on the crypto industry's investment in political campaigns.
"The cryptocurrency industry believes it is owed massive tax loopholes and functional subsidies," said Hauser, "because it has bought the president, paid for his ballroom project, and has funded dozens of congressional campaigns. The lack of campaign finance reform is the principal reason that the ludicrously corrupt Trump family is set to enjoy yet another tax loophole to exploit."
Timi Iwayemi, assistant director at RDP, said that "the cryptocurrency industry has facilitated the Trump family's corruption at every turn," while warning members of Congress against doing the industry's bidding.
"Lawmakers should be wary of creating new tax loopholes to benefit the Trump family and their donors in the crypto industry," said Iwayemi. "Rewarding this behavior will embolden the crypto industry and other corporate lobbies eager to seize on our elected representatives’ prioritization of donor interests at public expense."
'Not Even Trying to Hide Their Brazen Corruption': Trump Sons Set to Profit From Tungsten Mining Deal
A bombshell New York Times report detailing how President Donald Trump's eldest sons stand to profit from a tungsten mining deal negotiated by their billionaire father sparked outraged calls for accountability on Monday, with Democratic lawmakers characterizing the taxpayer-funded project as yet another example of the administration's unchecked and unprecedented corruption.
"You will not believe it until you see it laid out," US Rep. Mike Levin (D-Calif.) wrote in response to the Times story published over the weekend. According to the newspaper, Trump and his team—including billionaire Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick—"won an agreement from the Kazakh leader to give a little-known American company access to one of the world’s largest untapped reserves of tungsten, a metal that the United States desperately needs for the production of missile warheads, fighter jets, computer chips, and other critical goods."
Ahead of the deal's completion last September, according to the Times, the Trump administration "approved preliminary applications for as much as $1.6 billion in federal financing for the American company, now called Kaz Resources, which plans to break ground on the project in rural Kazakhstan."
Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr., along with Lutnick's sons Brandon and Kyle, are poised to benefit from the project. "Within weeks of the St. Regis negotiations, investors with a firm called Dominari Securities, which is housed at Trump Tower in New York and partly owned by the president’s two eldest sons... joined with other partners to take a 20% stake in a corporate entity related to the Kazakhstan project," the Times reported.
"We’ve seen 300,000 Georgians lose health coverage in the last six months because they couldn’t find room in the budget for health insurance. But they’ve got room in the budget for a tungsten mine overseas, controlled in part by Prince Don and Prince Eric," Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-Ga.) said in an MS NOW appearance late Monday.
Ossoff: You’ve got the American government, controlled by Donald Trump, backing a Trump family tungsten mine in Kazakhstan with more than a billion dollars in federal commitments at the very same time that they are cutting health care, defunding hospitals and nursing homes, and… pic.twitter.com/LCZbJgLyUX
— Acyn (@Acyn) June 30, 2026
Lutnick's sons, meanwhile, "helped one of the lead investors... on the Kazakh deal raise $210 million in new capital for a related entity," potentially resulting in a multimillion-dollar boon for Cantor Fitzgerald, the investment firm overseen by Brandon and Kyle Lutnick.
"They're not even trying to hide their brazen corruption anymore," wrote US Rep. Don Beyer (D-Va.). "President Trump and Secretary Lutnick used your tax dollars to further enrich their families from a major mining deal with Kazakhstan."
Beyer stressed that "this isn't an isolated incident." The Times found that at least "14 companies working on critical mining deals with the US government that have ties to Cantor Fitzgerald or the Trump family," including Kaz Resources, Perpetua Resources, and USA Rare Earth.
Trump's family has profited massively from his return to the White House, thanks in a large part to a crypto scheme spearheaded by the president's eldest sons. A "Trump Family Digital Grift Wealth Tracker" maintained by Democrats on the House Oversight Committee estimates that crypto projects have netted the president and his family over $2.4 billion in profits so far.
"This is the most corrupt administration in American history. It is not close," Levin said Monday, accusing Trump's Republican allies—including House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.)—of enabling the president as he loots federal coffers to further enrich himself and his family.
"We must keep digging, and keep asking the questions they do not want asked," Levin added. "Republicans in Congress are unwilling to lift a finger. Mike Johnson is running a protection racket."
'This Is Corruption': Trump Bought Stock in Taser Maker Just Before ICE Contract Notice
US President Donald Trump bought up to $5 million worth of stock in the corporation that makes Taser electroshock guns, police body cameras, and policing software two weeks before his administration announced the solicitation of a $220 million contract apparently tailored to the company's product and services, CNBC revealed Monday.
CNBC's Luke Falcon reported that Trump disclosed the purchase of between $1-5 million in Axon Enterprise stock on February 10. Two weeks later, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) announced it was seeking a five-year, $220 million deal for 17,800 conductive energy weapons, unlimited cartridges, and support services.
Axon Enterprise stock skyrocketed over 22% immediately following ICE's announcement, although they're down more than 25% this year.
According to Falcon:
If finalized, the purchase would more than quadruple ICE’s current Taser arsenal, replacing about 4,300 devices in the field, according to the February notice.
The notice refers to an upgrade to the “T10,” Axon’s “Taser 10" model, to replace ICE’s older “X26P/X2 Tasers,” which are also Axon-made. It also specifies features associated with Taser 10, including a 45-foot range and 10 individually targeted probes—all specifications and capabilities that procurement experts say effectively foreclose other bidders.
"The concern is that [Trump] bought into a company whose business could grow if his own administration expands immigration enforcement," Jordan Libowitz, vice president for communications at the liberal-leaning watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, told CNBC.
Deborah Fleischaker—a former acting ICE chief of staff during the Biden administration who is now a senior immigration policy adviser at the Latino advocacy group UnidosUS—told Falcon that the timing of Trump's purchase "raises red flags."
“It is not smart to buy stock in a company that was impacted by the decisions you would be making at the agency,” she said. “I would have stayed far, far away from actual impropriety, or the appearance of impropriety.”
The ICE contract notice came as the agency and other Department of Homeland Security divisions were set to reap tens of billions of dollars in new funding thanks to Republicans' so-called One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
White House spokesperson Anna Kelly insisted that "there are no conflicts of interest" and that Trump's investments are managed by independent third parties.
"But the sequence raises a public integrity question: A president with a newly disclosed financial interest in a law enforcement technology company led an administration expanding immigration enforcement when one of its agencies sought a major purchase of products closely associated with that company," The Intellectualist contended on Monday.
Campaign for New York Health executive director Melanie D'Arrigo said on social media Monday: "Trump bought up to $5 million in stock of a company seeking an ICE contract that specifies products unique to that company. This is corruption. There's a reason why Trump fired the ethics watchdog who oversaw corruption and conflicts of interest in the executive branch."
Democrats on the House Oversight Committee and several watchdog groups have published running lists of dozens of instances of alleged and proven conflicts of interest and other corruption that have enriched Trump and his family by billions of dollars during his second term in office alone.
On Sunday, The New York Times reported that Trump and US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick reached a billion-dollar agreement with Kazakhstan to develop of one of the world's largest untapped deposits of tungsten, a key metal used to make missile warheads, fighter jets, computer chips, and other products.
According to the Times, within weeks of the deal taking shape, investors associated with Dominari Securities—a firm partly owned by Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, the president's sons—acquired a 20% stake in an entity connected to the Kazakhstan tungsten project. Lutnick's sons also reportedly raised capital for one of the project's investors, a role for which they stand to make millions of dollars.
"The corruption is breathtaking," former US Labor Secretary Robert Reich said Monday on social media in response to the Times report.
Despite Trump-Iran Deal, Netanyahu Says Israel Will Not Leave Lebanon 'As Long as I Am Prime Minister'
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated on Wednesday that he will not end the military occupation of Lebanon even if it tanks US President Donald Trump's peace deal with Iran.
"As long as I am prime minister, we will maintain the security zone in southern Lebanon," he said, referring to Israel's occupation, which has cleared about one-fifth of the country of its inhabitants.
About 1.2 million residents have been displaced by Israeli attacks and forced evacuation orders since March as part of a military campaign that's killed about 4,200 people, according to the Lebanese Ministry of Public Health.
As Trump seeks an end to his war with Iran, the Iranian delegation has stressed that it must be peace "on all fronts," including Lebanon, which was outlined in the memorandum of understanding that has served as the basis for ongoing negotiations.
Behind the scenes, Trump has reportedly fumed that by ramping up attacks on Lebanon, Israel is trying to sabotage the deal and drag the US back into war.
But while he and Vice President JD Vance have offered some uncommonly blunt criticism of Israel over the past week, they've not yet gone beyond words. And Israel's leaders seem to believe they won't.
Echoing the prime minister, Defense Minister Israel Katz said on Wednesday that the Israel Defense Forces were "not withdrawing" from Lebanon "even if there is an American demand to do so."
But he also stated that despite a US-mediated ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah, "as of this moment... there is no American demand for Israel to withdraw from Lebanon," which he described as "a political achievement."
That's not likely to sit well with the Iranians, who, in response to a wave of Israeli attacks this weekend, announced that they were once again closing off the Strait of Hormuz, threatening more of the economic pandemonium that Trump wants to quell by ending the war.
“For us, a ceasefire in Lebanon is as important as a ceasefire in Iran and, further, an end to the war in Lebanon is as important as an end to the war in Iran,” said Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Iran's parliamentary speaker and lead negotiator, on Wednesday.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has attempted to thread the needle by claiming on Wednesday that "the Israelis have been clear they don't have any quarrels with the Lebanese people, nor do they have any claims on the territory of Lebanon."
But this was undercut somewhat by Katz's statement on Wednesday that the 200,000 civilians whom Israel ordered to leave southern Lebanon "will not return" to their homes because of the risk they allegedly pose to Israeli soldiers.
"Soldiers in, residents out," Katz said. "The infrastructure is destroyed, the houses are dangerous and ruined. We are not withdrawing."
Critics have pointed out that Trump does have ample amounts of leverage to coerce the Israelis to get with the program, including threatening to cut off US weapons shipments, and that his failure to do this may destroy any chance at peace with Iran.
"The Israelis are going to continue testing what they can get away with," said Rania Khalek, a journalist for BreakThrough News, on social media. "Iran was very clear that a deal with the US is dependent on a ceasefire in Lebanon."
"How embarrassing for Trump that the Israelis don’t care about his orders. They are trying to preserve their ability to kill all their neighbors," she added. "Words are not enough to restrain the Israelis. There have to be real consequences."
Trump Plans to Make 250th US Birthday 'All About Himself' With Long Speech, Late Fireworks
One journalist said that "this is like the epitome of personalist rule—turning this into an imperial, dictatorial display of self-glorification."
As the desolate debacle of President Donald Trump's "Great American State Fair" continues against a backdrop of an empty National Mall and Shrek-green Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, criticism of the president's plans for his "most spectacular Trump rally" and record-seeking fireworks show mounted this week as new details of his self-aggrandizing extravaganza emerged.
"Our luck has it that America's 250 was when Trump is president, and we know that a big thrust of these 250 commemorations are in a lot of ways a celebration of Trump and Trumpism, and if it's not direct, it's the vision that Trump and the MAGA movement has of America," Center on Conscience & War executive director Mike Prysner told BreakThrough News on Tuesday.
Media Matters for America senior fellow Matt Gertz told Greg Sargent, who hosts The New Republic's The Daily Blast podcast, that "the fact that we are not going to be able to have a real celebration of America’s 250th birthday—one that respects how far we have traveled, how far we have to go... it’s a real shame that this is what we’re going to get instead: a would-be authoritarian ruler trying to make it all about himself."
On Monday, the Federal Aviation Administration made a late announcement that it would be shutting down air traffic at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport for three hours on July 3 and 12 hours on the Fourth of July "to help ensure the safe and efficient movement of air traffic during celebrations of America's 250th birthday, including the iconic flyovers and fireworks."
During a rally planned for July 4, Trump is expected to speak for at least 45 minutes starting at 9:00 pm. While attendees are advised to arrive very early, they're reportedly not allowed to bring coolers, lawn chairs, bags, or more than one bottle of water on a day when temperatures are forecast to soar to triple-digits.
Trump said earlier this month that a military flyover featuring a 17-aircraft formation will include the $400 million Boeing 747-8 "flying palace" gifted to Trump by the repressive Qatari monarchy.s
US Interior Secretary Doug Burgum told Fox News on Sunday that the Trump administration is then planning the "greatest and biggest celebration of fireworks ever."
The Washington Post reported Tuesday that 850,000 fireworks will be detonated in a 40-minute show scheduled to start unusually late—after 10:30 and possibly even 11:00 pm. That's 50 times as many explosions over twice the length of a typical Fourth of July fireworks show, which even in a typical year can spark severe anxiety in dogs and other pets and post-traumatic stress disorder in veterans.
Trump DC fireworks won't start until at least 10:30 p.m. Heavy TSA-like security, so people will have to get there way early. It's going to be one-billion degrees. No coolers, no metal/thermal water containers. Enjoy your $20 bottles of Trump water and your tearful, exhausted children! Happy Fourth!
— Rex Huppke (@rexhuppke.bsky.social) June 29, 2026 at 10:52 AM
If Trump's so-called "Great American State Fair" is any indication, there should be plenty of lawn space available on the National Mall for the July 4 events.
While the president posted a self-congratulatory message to his Truth Social Network on Monday, praising the "fantastic job" his administration has done during the first week of the event and claiming the National Mall was "packed with happy people," attendees and journalists reported "light crowds, short lines, and plenty of open space."
This, despite a nationwide ad blitz on Fox and other networks and websites viewed by scores of millions of people.
Some called it the "Great American Fail."
Former Republican Congressman Adam Kinzinger of Illinois said in a video posted Monday on Bluesky that "10 years ago I voted to create 'America 250.' But here's the truth: Trump started 'Freedom 250' to replace it, and made it about himself. Trump’s newest stunt? Trying to convince us there’s a big crowd for Freedom 250. But our eyes don't lie."
María José Gutierrez Chavez, trending news writer at the business magazine Fast Company, described "the unbearable emptiness of the Great American State Fair," writing that the purported celebration "looks more like a liminal space."
Gutierrez cited one TikTok user who commented, “I’ve seen graveyards with more people," and another who said that “there were more people in line for the Trader Joe’s summer tote bags."
Meanwhile, the iconic Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, a focal point of the semiquincentennial festivities, remains what Common Dreams columnist Abby Zimet described Tuesday as a "fetid debacle" as cleaning up the algae-choked centerpiece proves more difficult than anticipated.
Instead of blaming the no-bid contracted company owned by a Trump donor for the emerald embarrassment, detractors say the president has humiliated himself even further by attempting to pin the blame for his administration's failure on elusive vandals and former President Barack Obama.
Even some Trump supporters have had enough.
"This sucks," Fox News columnist David Marcus said earlier this month following an event featuring daredevil dirtbike jumps and Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) cage matches on the White House lawn that critics said looked like they were inspired by the classic Mike Judge dystopian satire Idiocracy.
"This pisses me off," Marcus said after one of the UFC fighters called former First Lady Michelle Obama a man. "You wanna throw out this nonsense at a rally? Fine. Not at an official Freedom 250 event. Disgraceful."
Some are calling on people to eschew the July 4 event in favor of local celebrations.
"This is like the epitome of personalist rule—turning this into an imperial, dictatorial display of self-glorification," Sargent said. "It’s important that Americans reject this and not show up to this."
Gertz concurred, replying, "I think what we have here is a president who does not respect any sort of separation between himself and the country at large."
"He views the idea of celebrating the nation’s birthday as one and the same with celebrating himself," he added.
Supreme Court Upholds Transgender Athlete Bans, Giving States Green Light For Discrimination
"We have entered a period when the legal recognition and legal protections for trans and intersex people are at an all-time low," said the Center for Constitutional Rights.
In a ruling that defenders of LGBTQ+ rights say clears the way for discrimination, the US Supreme Court upheld state laws banning transgender girls and women from participating on school and college athletic teams.
In a decision that will likely supercharge attacks on transgender people by red states and the Trump administration, the court said that state-level bans on transgender athletes did not violate either the 14th Amendment of the Constitution or Title IX, the federal law prohibiting sex discrimination in education.
The court's six conservatives ruled that Idaho and West Virginia did not violate the equal protection clause because the laws were made in the interest of athletic fairness.
"Biological males generally possess inherent physical advantages in sports," wrote Justice Brett Kavanaugh for the majority, describing it as a topic where there is still "medical and scientific uncertainty."
He dismissed equal protection claims from two athletes: 16-year-old shot put champion Becky Pepper-Jackson of West Virginia and 25-year-old Boise State student Lindsey Hecox, who failed to make her school's cross-country team because she was "too slow" but played in club-level sports.
The athletes argued that they took puberty-blocking medication that would have blunted their advantages, but Kavanaugh wrote that states were under no obligation to "grant individualized exemptions to specific athletes or subclasses."
The court ruled unanimously that West Virginia's state ban did not violate Title IX. But the court's three liberals disagreed on the question of equal protection.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor said that the scientific uncertainty surrounding the question was precisely why states should proceed with caution rather than enact categorical bans.
“In the end, to the court, the facts do not matter, even though the consequences are serious,” she wrote in her dissent.
She added that state bans will be harmful to trans people seeking friendship and community through sports. She said because of the court's decision, a state can deny young people "these experiences simply because it thinks they have an inherent athletic advantage, even if the facts show that they do not."
Sasha Buchert, senior attorney and director of the Non-Binary and Transgender Rights Project at Lambda Legal—which represented Pepper-Jackson—said the ruling was "deeply harmful for transgender women and girls who only asked for the ability to participate in sports with their peers."
"Countless studies have demonstrated the myriad benefits that come with participation in team sports," she added. "Now, one population, transgender youth and collegians, are targeted for specific and baseless discrimination."
The decision effectively legitimizes efforts in more than two dozen Republican-led states that have adopted bans on transgender athletes. However, Shannon Minter, the legal director of the National Center for LGBTQ Rights (NCLR), noted that the decision did not go as far as it could have, allowing other states to leave intact policies that let trans students participate.
"This is a disappointing decision, but also a narrow one that leaves the door open for the many states and schools that have adopted reasonable policies that protect both fairness and inclusion with respect to transgender students," Minter said. "Today’s limited decision means that states and schools across the country still have the power to make reasonable rules to ensure fairness without banning all transgender girls."
NCLR staff attorney Rachel Berg said that the ruling still "ignores clear discrimination and political attacks against transgender girls" and invites "invasive policing of young people's bodies."
"Blanket bans on transgender girls playing school sports invite anyone to call for a ‘gender check’ on any girl who wants to play sports if they think she is ‘too tall’ or ‘too strong,’” she warned.
Lambda Legal listed several cases in which young people in states with bans have been singled out and targeted with aggressive physical scrutiny by state officials:
In Florida, a 15-year-old junior varsity volleyball player was the subject of a police investigation after an anonymous accusation, prompting local officials to draft a 500-page report investigating her medical history, body weight, and anatomy. In Utah, a teenage basketball player was accused of being transgender by a member of the state board of education, leading to threats of violence against her and her family, and a teenager in Maine faced a similar attack from a state senator. In May, President Donald Trump similarly targeted a 16-year-old transgender girl for participating in a high school track meet. Under an Arizona ban, a cisgender male student was prohibited from participating on the boys’ team at his high school because of a clerical error that listed him as female on his original birth certificate.
Tuesday's decision comes amid an onslaught of other state-level legislation attacking transgender people, including bans on gender-affirming care for youth, bathroom bans, restrictions and invalidations of legal documents, and laws prohibiting schools from respecting students' preferred gender identities.
Karla Gonzales Garcia, the gender, sexuality, and identity director at Amnesty International USA, said the decision also "comes at a time of rising authoritarian practices under the Trump administration, which use gender and sexuality as a cultural battle for political gain."
The administration has threatened to investigate, sue, and strip funding from schools that accept trans athletes; attempted to throttle medical funding for hospitals that provide gender-affirming care; banned transgender people from the military; and pushed to force transgender women into men's prisons where they are at severe risk of sexual assault.
The Center for Constitutional Rights said that Tuesday's ruling "confirms what trans and intersex advocates have known for some time: we are in the Plessy v. Ferguson/Bowers v. Hardwick era of trans rights," referring to Supreme Court cases that upheld Jim Crow segregation and state bans on homosexuality.
"We have entered a period when the legal recognition and legal protections for trans and intersex people are at an all-time low," the group continued. "Anti-trans policymakers and activists have, through their actions and rhetoric, made their goal clear: to terrorize trans people and remove them from public life."
Several Democratic members of Congress expressed solidarity with the transgender community following the ruling.
"The Supreme Court’s ruling to allow states to ban trans kids from playing in sports is discriminatory and opens the door to incredibly invasive examinations of children to determine who can play on what team," said Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), whose adult daughter is trans. "This decision targets a tiny population of athletes and further emboldens Republicans’ anti-trans crusade."
Rep. Brittany Pettersen (D-Colo.) warned that the decision "hands Trump yet another weapon to strip protections and funding from schools across our nation," and said Republicans were "weaponizing our most vulnerable kids as pawns in a fight they did not choose."
Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) said: "We will keep fighting. Discrimination and hate will not win."
'Unconscionable,' Says Khanna as House Panel Blocks Effort to Prevent Deeper US-Israeli Military Ties
"They're not even giving us a vote on the amendment," said Rep. Ro Khanna, who vowed to "continue to fight to make sure we don't compromise American sovereignty."
A Republican-controlled House panel on Monday refused to allow a floor vote on a bipartisan amendment to prevent closer integration of the American and Israeli militaries, which human rights organizations say would deepen US complicity in Israeli war crimes.
"This is unconscionable," Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), who led the proposed amendment alongside Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), said in a video posted to social media on Tuesday. "They're not even giving us a vote on the amendment."
Khanna vowed that "Thomas and I will continue to fight to make sure we don't compromise American sovereignty."
Watch:
Congress has blocked the amendment @RepThomasMassie and I introduced to stop the integration of our military with Israel’s. It is unconscionable to not even have a vote. We will be continuing on and will not be intimidated by the pro-Israel lobby. pic.twitter.com/6ai93L0rAY
— Ro Khanna (@RoKhanna) June 30, 2026
The Khanna-Massie amendment would have removed the US-Israel Defense Technology Cooperation Initiative from annual military policy legislation currently moving through Congress. The initiative, laid out in Section 219 of the House's National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), instructs the Pentagon to "designate an executive agent... responsible for synchronizing cooperative efforts between the United States and Israel, to expand and accelerate bilateral defense technology research, development, testing, evaluation, integration, and industrial cooperation."
On Monday, the House Rules Committee unveiled a list of NDAA amendments that it decided would get a full House vote, and the Khanna-Massie proposal was absent. Ben Freeman noted at Responsible Statecraft that the rules panel made its decision "after no debate" on the amendment.
"By rejecting the Khanna and Massie amendment, the Rules Committee on Monday ensured the American public would not even get to see how their representatives would vote on this pivotal issue," Freeman wrote. "This is despite unprecedented levels of public distrust in the Israeli government and widespread public outrage directed at these proposals."
The fight to block the US-Israel Defense Technology Cooperation Initiative—which is enthusiastically backed by the pro-Israel lobbying group AIPAC—is not necessarily over.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said earlier this month that lawmakers "must" strip the initiative from the NDAA, signaling a possible fight over the provision in the upper chamber. A summary of the Senate version of the NDAA states that the legislation would establish "the United States-Israel Defense Technology Cooperation Initiative to expand and accelerate bilateral defense technology research, development, testing, evaluation, coordination, and industrial cooperation between the US and
Israel."
Leading human rights organizations, including Amnesty International USA and Human Rights Watch (HRW), have urged lawmakers to reject the cooperation initiative, with the latter group warning that the proposal would "deepen US military cooperation with Israel while walling that cooperation off from further congressional oversight."
"Israeli forces’ widespread war crimes, crimes against humanity, and its ongoing acts of genocide in Gaza should give the United States pause about closer military association," said Akshaya Kumar, HRW's director of crisis advocacy. "Instead, Section 219 proposes to deepen entanglement, in a way that makes the risks of complicity ongoing. Legislators still have a chance to strip this damaging proposal out."