President Donald Trump's administration is asking Congress for an additional $10 million to help cover costs tied to the Freedom 250 celebration, which included the poorly attended Great American State Fair, a prayer event, and a large-scale July 4 fireworks display intended to break a world record but not yet recognized by Guinness, The New Republic reported.

Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR), the ranking Democrat on the relevant Senate Appropriations subcommittee, told The Washington Post that the Trump administration had initially embedded the funding request within a broader stopgap spending bill intended to keep the government operational. Such continuing resolutions are typically used to maintain existing funding levels during budget negotiations, making an unspecific new spending line unusual. Merkley said the request did not specify a dollar amount and was described as necessary "to recoup costs associated with support of events celebrating America's semiquincentennial."

The request has intensified scrutiny over the administration's spending on the semiquincentennial celebration. Trump's One Big Beautiful Act already allocated $150 million last year for anniversary-related costs. According to The Post, most of that funding was redirected to Freedom 250, a Trump-aligned public-private partnership that effectively displaced America250, the bipartisan organization Congress had originally established under a 2016 law to plan and coordinate the 250th anniversary commemorations across all 50 states.

In June, Trump administration officials also moved approximately $90 million from the National Park Service, drawing on entrance fees collected at some of the country's most visited parks, including Yellowstone and Yosemite, to finance anniversary-related projects. Entrance fees are normally reinvested directly into the parks where they are collected for maintenance and visitor services; the diversion came as the Park Service continues to grapple with a deferred maintenance backlog that has exceeded $20 billion in recent years. Private donations also contributed to funding the fair, with corporate backers including Boeing, Chevron, Lockheed Martin, and Palantir.

Trump administration officials subsequently stated they "needed the money to cover routine National Park Service costs incurred during the events." However, the Department of the Interior offered a different rationale, telling The Post that the funding was required due to "heightened security needs in light of recent threats levied at the president" following the assassination attempt at the White House Correspondents' Dinner in April and the UFC event held on the White House lawn.

Source: Raw Story