On Wednesday, President Trump signed a truly awesome executive order.
The order establishes a task force to plan an “extraordinary celebration” in honor of America’s 250th anniversary, on July 4, 2026. If Trump’s campaign speeches are any indication, the festivities will begin on Memorial Day 2025 and will include a “Great American State Fair” in Iowa, and a “Patriot Games” for high school athletes from across the country.
Additionally, the executive order re-establishes the plan to create a National Garden of American Heroes, a statue garden filled with statues of 250 historical figures. The order goes so far as to commission artists for the first 100 statues, indicating that the statue garden isn’t just an abstract hope, but is actually on the path towards becoming reality. “The National Garden will honor American heroism after dozens of monuments to Americans, including Presidents and Founding Fathers, have toppled or destroyed and never restored,” said a press release.
Speaking of statues that have been topped or destroyed and never restored, the executive order reinstates Trump’s order from 2020 that was aimed at protecting existing statues from destruction at the hands of bigots and bullies. This policy directs the Attorney General to prosecute people and groups responsible for vandalizing and/or destroying statues to the fullest extent of the law. It also withholds federal funding from state and local law enforcement agencies that fail to do the same. The AP describes this order as “reviving efforts to harshly punish those who vandalize or destroy existing statues and monuments.” This is true, and there is absolutely nothing bad about it, because harsh punishment is exactly what such people deserve.
As alluded to above, you might recall that both the plans for the statue garden and the policy strengthening punishments for anti-statue bullies existed previously thanks to an executive order that Trump signed during a dark time that feels simultaneously like yesterday and like a million years ago. (I blogged about it here.) Unfortunately, within his first few days of taking office, Biden mean-spiritedly and cruelly signed an executive order rescinding both of these policies, thereby cancelling plans for the statue garden and deliberately declining to punish the people in our country who are the most deserving of punishment. Although this new executive order doesn’t undo the unspeakable atrocities that were done, I am heartened that Trump has once again chosen to stand up for the statues.
I will never stop fighting for statues, I will never stop advocating on their behalf, I will never forget or forgive what happened to them, and I will never stop writing about them. This is what is truly important. This is what matters. And I’m truly glad that President Trump, to a significant extent, feels the same.