The Trump administration has issued an executive order laying out plans for “Celebrating America’s 250th Birthday.” Veuer’s Matt Hoffman reports.
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00:00America has a big birthday coming up, and President Trump will be the one throwing the party.
00:04July 4th, 2026 will be the 250th anniversary of the country's founding.
00:09On Wednesday, the White House issued an executive order titled
00:12Celebrating America's 250th Birthday, laying out a plan for arranging the festivities.
00:17The order establishes a task force for this work,
00:19shared by Trump with Vice President J.D. Vance as vice chair.
00:22Trump is supposed to appoint an executive director,
00:24and other members of the task force will include cabinet members
00:27such as the Secretary of State and the Secretary of Defense.
00:30The order also restarts plans for the so-called National Garden of American Heroes,
00:34a sculpture garden celebrating famous cultural figures from throughout American history.
00:38According to Politico, this was an initiative begun in Trump's first term
00:42and later canceled by President Biden.
00:44Relatedly, the order also reinstates a 2020 Trump order called
00:47Protecting American Monuments, Memorials, and Statues and Combating Recent Criminal Violence.
00:52The new order says,
00:53Recent examples of conduct necessitating reinstatement of this order include
00:57pro-Hamas-related vandalism of historically significant public monuments
01:01and related assaults on federal officers and employees following October 7, 2023.
01:05But critics of Trump may find this ironic,
01:07given his recent pardons of participants in the January 6th attack on the Capitol.
01:11In 1976, America's bicentennial was the occasion for a year of patriotic celebration.
01:16This time around, bringing Americans together may be a taller order.