July 4 live: Trump’s America 250 in chaos with empty state fair, collapsing stage and Reflecting Pool feud

Comedian and former talk show host Rosie O’Donnell has hit back at the president after she was featured in a spoof AI video he posted on Truth Social among a group of celebrities said to be suffering from “Trump Derangement Syndrome.”

The clip also featured versions of John Leguizamo, Whoopi Goldberg, Ed Norton, Robert De Niro and Julia Roberts offering “testimonials” about their struggles with the non-existent condition, with Trump, dressed as a doctor, prescribing Diet Coke for their symptoms.

Speaking to The Guardian, O’Donnell said: “He’s quite ill – and getting worse daily. The 25th Amendment exists for exactly this reason. Remove. Impeach. Convict.”

Here’s Owen Scott on the video in question.

On his social media platform overnight, the president has revived an old complaint from his first term about other members of the North Atlantic military alliance not contributing enough of their annual GDP to its upkeep as the U.S.

“Ridiculous for the U.S.A. to continue along this one sided path when the relationship is not reciprocal. They were not there for us!!!”

He also announced the opening of a new exhibition in Washington celebrating such heroes of the American Revolution as Caesar Rodney, who is being immortalized with an equestrian statue.

“I am thrilled to announce the opening of SPIRIT OF ’76 at FREEDOM PLAZA, a new Exhibition in Washington, D.C., honoring the Heroes and Martyrs of the American Revolution. This Exhibition includes a series of statues, including an equestrian statue of Founding Father Caesar Rodney, 12 Soldiers of the Revolution, and a set of reliefs honoring the Prison Ship Martyrs.

“The nearly 12,000 Americans who lost their lives aboard British ships in conditions of unimaginable deprivation, squalor, and disease. More Americans died on these prison ships than in all of the War’s battles combined – Many of whom willingly endured suffering and death rather than renounce the Patriot cause.

“The Exhibition is anchored by a central bronze statue, ‘Spirit of Liberty,’ which is crowned in a wreath of victory, and powerfully wielding the Declaration of Independence and a sword pointed to the sky. Everyone should see this new Exhibition!As we prepare to celebrate the 250th Birthday of our beloved Country, these statues and monuments now stand prominently in the heart of our Nation’s Capital as a celebration of the 250-year Triumph of the American Spirit, which is now STRONGER, GREATER, and MORE GLORIOUS than ever before!”

A portion of the main stage built for the president’s Fourth of July celebrations collapsed during a rehearsal session yesterday, nearly striking a performer.

Footage circulating on social media shows a group of dancers rehearsing their routine to music, then abruptly stopping as a piece of an overhead structure breaks off and careers towards the stage below.

The dancers managed to move out of the path of the falling debris in time and, fortunately, no injuries were reported as a result of the incident.

The mishap follows weeks of complaints about Trump’s Great American State Fair, which attendees and critics have labeled a mess.

The fair has faced persistent issues with delayed infrastructure, low attendance and poor organization from the start.

Video and photos from the event show sparse crowds, which have reportedly angered the president.

Jasmine Fernandez has more.

President Donald Trump is heading to Mount Rushmore today for another round of 250th anniversary celebrations.

When he arrives in Keystone in the Black Hills of South Dakota later, the president will be greeted by Gov. Larry Rhoden and take in a fireworks display above the iconic landmark, an event environmentalists have warned could risk sparking wildfires.

Interior Secretary Doug Burgum has previously said he sees no reason why Trump’s head could not be added to the mountain sculpture alongside those of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt.

The president will then return to Washington, D.C., for Saturday’s Fourth of July festivities, at which he has pledged to deliver a “really long” speech at a Salute to America event in defiance of what are forecast to be sweltering temperatures.

“I could know about it,” Trump told CNBC on Thursday. “I didn’t. There’s nothing illegal. There’s nothing wrong with it.”

“I don’t do anything having to do with my business,” Trump added of his assets, which he says are held in a trust managed by his children and independent financial institutions.

Of his money managers, the Republican claimed in the CNBC interview that he didn’t even “know who they are.”

Critics have accused the president of influence trading via his family’s crypto operations, which he and the Trump Organization deny.

The president was “livid” over an aerial image of his MAGA rally-style remarks to mark the opening of the shambolic event last week, which NBC News later reported as having drawn “nowhere near” the 45,000-strong crowd he boasted about on Truth Social, CNN reported.

The network reported that his angry reaction prompted his own staff to scrub photos of the small crowds from official and personal social media channels in a vain attempt to memory-hole the poor turnout.

Trump had turned the launch event for his Freedom 250 project into a celebration of himself as much as America’s 250th birthday after a group of artists booked to perform backed out because they’d been led to believe it had been organized by America 250, the bipartisan, Congressionally chartered group celebrating America’s 250th anniversary that has been sidelined by the MAGA-aligned Freedom 250 organization.

The agency remained unaware of these critical communications on July 13, 2024, due to its failure to establish a joint communications room with local law enforcement.

Local authorities were actively receiving reports about the search for a suspicious person, later identified as Thomas Crooks.

“Instead, we found that the Secret Service received only five phone calls and three text messages about Crooks,” the Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general’s report noted. “As a result, Secret Service members did not alert President Trump’s protective detail about concerns of a suspicious person.”

Jasper Ward has the story.

A salary report sent to Congress this week puts the top White House pay at $197,200 in 2026. Nine of the 411 employees in the Executive Office of the President earned that amount, but many work behind the scenes, including on anti-fraud efforts and the fast-evolving world of cryptocurrency.

They include Scott Brady, executive director of the Anti-Fraud Task Force; Harry Jung, the deputy director of the Presidential Council of Advisers for Digital Assets; and Blake Deeley, the executive director of the National Energy Dominance Council.

They, and the other six individuals, are all listed as “detailees” or “part-time detailees,” meaning they’re federal employees who have been temporarily brought in from other agencies.

A White House official told NOTUS — which published the salary report on Wednesday — that pay rates for detailees are set by their home agencies and calculated using a federal government pay scale.

On Wednesday, Fox News dropped polls out of a host of states, including for the governor’s races in Iowa and Georgia.

The numbers should not inspire confidence for Republicans in states Trump won in 2024, particularly Iowa, which he turned from a perpetual swing state to blood red in the span of a decade.

In Georgia, which is becoming bluer with almost each election, Republican businessman Rick Jackson trails former Atlanta Mayor Keshia Lance Bottoms by five percentage points at 52 percent to 47 percent. The numbers are worse in Iowa, where Democratic Auditor Rob Sand is beating Zach Lahn 53 percent to 44 percent.

But perhaps the most interesting part is that Trump endorsed neither of these candidates in their gubernatorial primaries. In both cases, Trump endorsed their opponents: in Georgia, he endorsed Lt. Governor Burt Jones, whom he had supported to replace the anti-Trump Republican Geoff Duncan; and in Iowa, he endorsed Rep. Randy Feenstra to be the Republican nominee for governor.

It’s a sign that while Trump still has an tight grip on the GOP, he might be losing some control of the party as it looks beyond him.

Eric Garcia has the story.

A federal appeals court on Thursday limited the Trump administration’s ability to indefinitely detain migrants, finding that they are entitled to a bond hearing within 90 days.

The Trump White House has pushed to massively expand mandatory immigration detention, including against migrants who lack prior criminal records.

“It is part of the historic majesty of this long-ago founding charter that it makes no exceptions in providing basic rights to those within our boundaries, including a right to be heard when personal liberty is taken,” Judge Leslie Southwick wrote in today’s ruling.

Here’s more on the practice at issue in the case: