A decade before America’s 250th anniversary, Congress created a bipartisan commission to coordinate the festivities. The commission, named America 250, was supposed to build infrastructure projects, produce educational materials and facilitate “all fitting and proper activities” for the celebration.
But as July 4 nears, a separate organization called Freedom 250, created by President Trump, has taken over the handling of the biggest and boldest events.
It is Freedom 250, not America 250, that has taken the lead on Mr. Trump’s grand plans for the anniversary, which include a triumphal arch, a National Garden of American Heroes and a Great American State Fair on the National Mall. Last weekend, Freedom 250 lent its name to an Ultimate Fighting Championship cage match on the White House lawn.
The story of how there came to be two groups working on the anniversary celebrations — one created by Congress and the other by Mr. Trump — is a tale of government dysfunction and deep partisanship at what would normally be a moment of national unity. And behind the scenes, the power struggle has been driven by a president who is willing to push Congress aside and bring his own personal brand to the country’s marquee celebrations.
Congressional Democrats view Freedom 250 as little more than a hostile takeover of what should be a nonpartisan celebration of the country.
“Freedom 250 is a vanity project that this president has put forth because he has an insatiable ego,” said Representative Bonnie Watson Coleman, a New Jersey Democrat who has been on the America 250 commission since 2019.
Some states have declined to participate in Freedom 250’s Great American State Fair, with at least one pointing to the growing partisan sheen. Artists like Young MC, Martina McBride and Bret Michaels have pulled out of performances and accused the organizers of misleading them, after learning the events were closely associated with Mr. Trump.
The president, stung by the artists’ withdrawal, has insisted the show will go on — with himself as the main attraction. On social media, he billed himself as the “Number One Attraction” on earth, “the man who gets much larger audiences than Elvis in his prime.”
America 250, meanwhile, is moving ahead with its own celebrations, including an “America’s Block Party” concert on July 4 with Chris Stapleton, the Smashing Pumpkins and Queen Latifah.
Privately, some observers say Freedom 250 stepped into a void left by the bipartisan commission. For years, America 250 had little to show for itself other than internal fighting. Early on, the group concerned itself mostly with branding exercises. It did not undertake infrastructure projects and never met in public.
When Mr. Trump returned to the Oval Office, America 250 had nearly a decade to plan, 33 commission meetings, more than $60 million in public funding and no large, splashy events on the books. Mr. Trump, who had been thinking about this milestone since his first term, moved to establish more control, bypassing America 250 and creating Freedom 250 instead.
As a result, Freedom 250 received the lion’s share of the $150 million Congress dedicated last year to anniversary events, angering critics who believe more should have gone to the bipartisan commission. America 250 has received just $25 million of the funds, with the Trump administration thus far keeping the rest for its own priorities. This has prompted congressional inquiries and a lawsuit against the Trump administration to compel transparency about how the public funding is being used.
Now, both groups are attempting to pull off major 250th anniversary celebrations, sometimes working together and sometimes not, even as planned events fall apart.
And Mr. Trump is repeatedly stepping in to make himself ever more a part of the festivities.
On Monday, Mr. Trump announced that on July 4, he would host a large event at the Lincoln Memorial for the anniversary, complete with military flyovers and what he said would be the largest fireworks show in history.
On social media, the president said the event — to be held on the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence — would be a “TRUMP RALLY.”
‘Legacy Initiatives’
America 250 started out with lofty goals.
The commission wanted to create projects like those whose legacy has stood the test of time. For America’s 200th anniversary, for example, the National Air and Space Museum opened in Washington; a 12-week Festival of American Folklife was held on the National Mall; New Jersey created Liberty State Park as the state’s “gift to the nation”; and Queen Elizabeth II visited Philadelphia and presented the Bicentennial Bell as a gift. The centennial celebration featured the first World’s Fair in the United States.
According to a 2019 report that America 250 submitted to the White House, the group aimed to inspire more than 100,000 programs and total public and private investment of up to $5 billion.
“Preservation of historical sites, historical society formation, and museum establishment and expansion surged in the lead-up to the bicentennial,” the group wrote. It added, “We will strive to create legacy initiatives that will survive well beyond 2026.”
Andrew Hohns, an original member of the congressional commission, said he had worked with a Philadelphia architecture firm that prepared a proposal with major infrastructure and historical preservation projects in the country’s birthplace. But he said the commission ignored it.
“America 250 leadership steered instead toward ephemeral programming and a decentralized branding tool kit,” said Dr. Hohns, who has led a 250th planning effort in Philadelphia since 2008 and pushed for the creation of the national commission, which he left in June 2023.
In an interview, Rosie Rios, who was appointed to the commission in 2018 and is now its leader, said the early days were so dysfunctional that it would have been “embarrassing to have public meetings.”
Ms. Rios blamed much of the panel’s early difficulties on what she called two “rogue commissioners” who are no longer on the board. Even so, she said, it is not unusual for congressional commissions, which include different political parties, to be marred by fighting. The original commission created to celebrate America’s 200th anniversary in 1976 was so deeply flawed, it was disbanded three years before the celebration and replaced with a new one.
Ms. Rios said she had recommended that Mr. Trump, who wanted major events pulled off quickly, use an executive order to get all of government involved in the festivities. In doing so, America 250 gave up control of some events, but she said she was proud of the events that the commission has backed, and described them as inclusive of a diverse country, including eight ball drops to celebrate the anniversary in the country’s eight time zones.
“Our programming has been solid,” she said. “Our goal is to cast a wide net, participation from sea to shining sea, not just D.C., not just the 13 colonies, but everywhere, from Guam to Alaska, from Fairbanks to Philadelphia, and everything in between.”
But with Freedom 250 using the majority of taxpayer money Congress appropriated last year, she acknowledged that America 250 has had to limit its ambitions.
‘One of the Great Milestones’
Freedom 250, by contrast, seems interested mainly in scaling up to meet Mr. Trump’s vision.
On Sunday night, the group staged a massive Ultimate Fighting Championship cage match on the South Lawn of the White House — a mass-media spectacle that included a towering, claw-like structure where men beat each other to a pulp.
Mr. Trump’s interest in marking the anniversary his way dates back to his first term, when he spoke about it during his first joint address to Congress.
“In nine years, the United States will celebrate the 250th anniversary of our founding — 250 years since the day we declared our independence,” Mr. Trump said in 2017. “It will be one of the great milestones in the history of the world.”
When he took back the presidency, one of his first actions was to sign an executive order that ultimately gave the administration the lead in planning the major 250th anniversary celebrations and led to the creation of Freedom 250.
The groups in many cases appear to have competing visions.
America 250 says it wants to reflect all Americans, with a student essay contest and a time capsule to open in 250 years that includes contributions from all 50 states and territories and a copy of the U.S. Constitution signed by all living Supreme Court justices.
Freedom 250 has faced criticism for presenting only a sanitized version of American history that ignores slavery and other institutionalized forms of racism. For example, materials for a Freedom 250 student contest include a description of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. as having a “can-do” spirit, but make no direct mention of the racism that he fought.
In particular, critics say the Freedom Truck program, which consists of a fleet of six mobile museums, presents a whitewashed depiction of American history. The exhibits were designed with assistance from Hillsdale College, a conservative school in Michigan, and PragerU, a company that makes conservative educational materials.
A Freedom Truck was scheduled to stop recently at Westfield State University in Massachusetts. But members of the community complained about its partisan nature and the police department there, which was coordinating the stop, canceled the plans.
Freedom 250 representatives declined to be interviewed but have said that the group is nonpartisan.
Senator Jeanne Shaheen, Democrat of New Hampshire and a member of the America 250 commission, said the group’s goal was to bring the country together.
“I’m disappointed to see President Trump’s Freedom 250 politicize what should be a moment for unity, not personal glory or partisan point-scoring,” she said.
Jennifer Schuessler in New York contributed reporting.
