President Donald Trump hasn’t formally acknowledged Juneteenth, however he did spend time Thursday complaining on social media that Individuals have “too many non-working holidays.”
“It is costing our Country $BILLIONS OF DOLLARS to keep all of these businesses closed,” the president wrote on his Reality Social platform on Thursday night. “The workers don’t want it either! Soon we’ll end up having a holiday for every once [sic] working day of the year. It must change if we are going to, MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”
Earlier Thursday, White Home press secretary Karoline Leavitt made it clear Trump has no plans to rejoice the federal vacation.
“I’m not tracking his signature on a proclamation today,” Leavitt stated throughout a press briefing. “I know this is a federal holiday. I want to thank all of you for showing up to work. We are certainly here. We are working 24/7 right now.”
Juneteenth was formally designated a federal vacation in 2021 after a invoice to codify the vacation handed each chambers of Congress with overwhelming bipartisan help.
In 2020, Trump took credit score for Juneteenth gaining nationwide recognition and even campaigned on making it a federal vacation.
“I did something good: I made Juneteenth very famous,” he stated after he confronted sharp criticism for scheduling a marketing campaign rally on June 19, 2020. “It’s actually an important event, an important time. But nobody had ever heard of it.”
Black Individuals have lengthy celebrated Juneteenth, which commemorates the day in 1865 when a Union common rode into Galveston, Texas and advised enslaved folks there that the warfare was over and so they had been free — months after the battle had ended and greater than two years after Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation.
Trump’s silence about Juneteenth marks a break from custom established throughout his first administration. He commemorated the vacation with a presidential message annually of that time period.
“As a Nation, we vow to never forget the millions of African Americans who suffered the evils of slavery,” he wrote in 2018.
However in his second time period as president, Trump has actively labored to dismantle variety, fairness and inclusion efforts within the federal authorities, whereas concurrently sanitizing the historical past of systemic racism in opposition to Black Individuals.
Because of Trump’s warfare on DEI initiatives, many Juneteenth celebrations throughout the nation have been scaled again or canceled altogether as funding has decreased. About 15% of firms surveyed in a latest research stated they’d now not rejoice occasions like Juneteenth.
Whereas Trump’s message on Thursday appeared to point that he has set his sights on ending Juneteenth’s federal vacation standing, he’ll first want Congress’ help to take action.
