Turns out “Freedom” isn’t free — and neither is Trump’s sparsely attended 250th anniversary bash.
The Department of the Interior is going back to Congress with its hand out again, this time asking for another $10 million to cover costs from this summer’s Freedom 250 festivities: a Christian prayer service, the Great American State Fair, and the July 4th fireworks show that tried (and failed) to set a world record. That’s on top of the $150 million Congress already handed over — money the administration swore private donors would supplement.
Instead, taxpayers are footing more of the bill. According to Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley, the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations subcommittee that oversees National Mall funding, the administration first tried to slip the request into a more extensive stopgap spending bill without specifying an amount, The Independent reports.
When his office pushed for details, officials gave one explanation to his staff — routine National Park Service costs — and a different one entirely to the Washington Post, which reported the request needed to cover “elevated security” after several high-profile incidents in D.C., including an attack at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner and vandalism around the Mall.
Merkley isn’t buying it. He’s calling the ask “unacceptable,” pointing out that Freedom 250 — not the public — should be picking up costs it was designated to handle. He’s now demanding an itemized accounting of how the initial amount of $150 million was spent.
“It is unacceptable to ask the American people to bail out Freedom 250,” Merkley wrote to Interior Secretary Doug Burgum. Interestingly, Burgum dismissed calls to disclose the donors on CNN last month.
Meanwhile, Freedom 250 hasn’t exactly been hurting for cash. The group has pulled in donations from federal contractors currently doing business with the Trump administration, including Palantir, Boeing, Chevron, and Lockheed Martin — companies that, notably, and unsurprisingly, aren’t the ones being asked to cover the shortfall.
Via The Independent:
The fair suffered poor attendance, closures and delays from extreme heat and thunderstorms, power outages and near-empty exhibits after some states decided not to participate altogether.
The fair ran for 16 days, got shut down early during a triple-digit heat wave over Independence Day weekend, and sent at least 11 people to the hospital.