Donald Trump’s large-scale, high-cost military parade—which corresponds with Flag Day, the Army’s 250th anniversary, and the president’s 79th birthday—is stepping down Constitution Avenue in Washington, DC on a wet and dreary Saturday as anti-Trump “No Kings” protests take place in cities nationwide.
“President Trump wants tanks in the street and a made-for-TV display of dominance for his birthday,” the No Kings protest website reads, “A spectacle meant to look like strength.” “But,” the organizers continue, “real power isn’t staged in Washington. It rises up everywhere else.”
The concurrent demonstrations come after weeks of preparation for the president’s display of military might. Trump’s all-day event—which includes Army fitness competitions, a parade of military vehicles and thousands of service members, and a concert accompanied by fireworks—fulfills a long-held goal for the president, one that, during his first term in office, had been squashed. This time around, he’s going big. It is expected to be the largest military parade in the nation’s capital since the end of the first Gulf War in 1991, per The Washington Post.
In total, according to a spokeswoman for the Army, the parade comes with a price tag of up to $45 million, though, until the activities have concluded and any needed repairs assessed, the final cost remains unknown.
About 150 ground vehicles, 6,600 soldiers, and 50 aircraft will appear in the parade, organized by each major era of the Army’s history, according to the Pentagon. Much of the cost included painting, preparing, and transporting these military vessels across the country. Flights in and out of Reagan National Airport will be halted for the military flyovers in the evening and, while the airport will remain open, flights in and out—around 100 total arrivals and departures—will be delayed for an average of about three hours.
The opposition is also going big. The No Kings protests are organized by the same groups who crafted the nationwide “Hands Off!” demonstrations in April: including Indivisible, the American Civil Liberties Union, and 50501. According to The New York Times, the demonstrations are “expected to be among the largest since the president’s second term began.” Protests are expected in all 50 states and several other countries, with main events slated for Atlanta, Chicago, Houston, New York, Phoenix, Philadelphia, and Charlotte, NC.
Notably, there are no demonstrations planned for Washington, DC, where the Trump administration has its parade. A local group within the city called Free DC is hosting a “DC Joy Day” at Anacostia Park on Saturday to celebrate the city’s “people, culture, and our connections to one another,” according to its website.
Leaving the nation’s capital out of the No Kings protests, according to Indivisible co-founder Leah Greenberg, was intentional.
When asked this week about the nationwide protests against him, Trump threatened demonstrators if they chose to take to DC’s streets.
“For those people that want to protest, they’re going to be met with very big force,” Trump said on Tuesday. “And I haven’t even heard about a protest, but you know, this is people that hate our country, but they will be met with very heavy force.”
Greenberg told the Times that organizers want the focus to be on the people, rather than putting more eyes on Trump’s military parade and giving the president an opportunity to carry out his threat. “We want to create contrast,” she said. “Not conflict.”
On Thursday, Trump responded directly to the idea that he is a king rather than a president. “I don’t feel like a king; I have to go through hell to get stuff approved,” he said, adding, “We’re not a king at all, thank you very much.”
Yet, just months ago, in February, President Trump employed that very language on his social media site, Truth Social. “CONGESTION PRICING IS DEAD. Manhattan, and all of New York, is SAVED,” he wrote, referencing one of his fights within his birth city. “LONG LIVE THE KING!”
On X, the official White House account amplified the message with an illustration of Trump on a pseudo-magazine cover, with a crown atop his head and a smile on his face.
X content
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Trump has long wanted a parade illustrating the United States’ Department of Defense—which currently touts a budget of over $841 billion. Before he headed into The White House in 2017, Trump told a Washington Post reporter that Americans could see the military “marching down Pennsylvania Avenue.” Then, months later, he told a Times reporter that he had “always thought” of doing such a parade.
As Trump orchestrates the largest military parade in Washington in decades, veterans across the country continue to be uniquely impacted by the president and his administration’s slashing of crucial federal funding programs. As PBS News reported, the administration’s eroding of the federal workforce disproportionately impacts veterans who, by law, receive an advantage in hiring over people who have not served in the military. Trump’s cuts also further impede medical care for veterans, suicide-prevention programs, and critical research aimed at further understanding of veterans’ well-being.
A group of veterans and their family members took to the US Capitol on Friday evening to protest the military parade, in addition to the president’s decision to deploy the National Guard and active-duty Marines in Los Angeles to quell anti-ICE protests in the city. Around 60 individuals were arrested after breaching a police line of bike racks and moving toward steps leading to the Capitol Rotunda, according to the Capitol Police. The group had planned a sit-in on the Capitol steps and left in a police van.
“We want a future where we invest in care for veterans, in health care, and in education,” Brittany Ramos DeBarros, an Army combat veteran and organizing director of About Face: Veterans Against the War, one of the groups who organized the Friday night protest, said.
“Not,” she continued in a statement, “where we spend $50 million on a parade.”
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