Trump hints Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu may visit US as early as next week

A politically charged holiday: The US celebrates its 250th anniversary

In many ways, Saturday was a typical July 4 holiday in the United States. The country marked the anniversary of its Declaration of Independence with hotdog-eating contests, parades, fireworks and baseball games. But this Independence Day was different, not least because it marked the country’s semiquincentennial: the 250th year since the US’s founding. It also was one of the most politically charged Independence Day celebrations in recent memory. President Donald Trump is expected to speak this evening from the National Mall in Washington, DC, right before what has been billed as the “world’s largest fireworks display”. More than 850,000 fireworks are expected to launch from barges in the Potomac River, lighting up the sky above the capital. But while Independence Day festivities have long been billed as non-partisan events, Trump has pledged to make the night’s celebration “the most spectacular TRUMP RALLY of them all”. The event comes as Trump’s Republican Party seeks to defend its control of Congress in November’s midterm elections, with a heated primary season already under way. On January 29, 2025 — just nine days into his second term as president — Trump issued an executive order establishing a White House task force to oversee celebrations for the 250th anniversary. It also alleges that Freedom 250 has been “operating outside the transparency and accountability requirements” Congress imposes on such celebrations — and that it may even have committed wire fraud by redirecting “unsuspecting donors” away from America250 and towards its own programmes. “Under President Donald Trump, this anniversary has been hijacked and perverted into a hotbed of corruption and self-enrichment,” the report reads.