The upcoming Freedom 250 Grand Prix is making the National Mall look more like a sideshow.
Photos of the preparation for the Indycar race this weekend show grandstands, finish lines, and signage all around the area in the nation’s capital.
It’s unusual to see corporate signage and bleachers near the Capitol building, but that’s how President Trump wants to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. The roads around the Mall are normally devoted to cars and tour buses at this time of year as tourists visit its national landmarks, museums, and monuments. But the streets look eerily empty except for construction workers, vehicles, and the barriers that will turn the area into a racetrack.
The Mall has been through a lot in Trump’s second term, from the heavily botched renovation of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool to that sparsely attended flop known as the Great American State Fair. He damaged the grass with his Independence Day celebrations and blamed nonexistent vandals for it when it was his own fault, just like with the pool disaster.
Now, the capital of the United States of America is about to see its first ever auto race. Under any other president, this might be considered cool, but now, the public is wondering not only how he’ll mess it up, but the damage he could cause to important national landmarks.
Air Force Major Jason Watson—who was arrested on the steps of the U.S. Capitol Building last month while calling for President Trump’s impeachment—has been arrested again.
Watson was detained on Tuesday, just one day after an exclusive CNN interview in which he said the president was “violating the Constitution, breaking the law, [and] engaged in rampant corruption.” Watson is currently in pretrial confinement in Maryland based on “allegations of continued misconduct” according to the Air Force. It did not identify the specific misconduct allegations, although his attorney believes that his recent CNN appearance is to blame.
“What is happening with President Trump is not normal. He has failed us,” Watson told CNN’s Erin Burnett on Monday. “And not only is he a failure as president, he is flagrantly violating the Constitution, breaking the law, engaged in rampant corruption, and is killing Americans. And that is unacceptable to me and it should be unacceptable to all of us.”
Air Force Maj. Jason Watson, who was arrested on the steps of the US Capitol after calling for Trump & Vance to be impeached and removed from office, speaks out to @ErinBurnett in his first interview after his arrest: “[Trump] is flagrantly violating the constitution, breaking… pic.twitter.com/fB1F2G3rDz
Watson’s July arrest came during a news conference with the Removal Coalition in which he called for Trump and Vice President JD Vance to be “impeached, convicted, and removed,” over their feckless leadership in the war on Iran. He was arrested and escorted off the premises while in full uniform and holding an “Impeach. Convict. Remove” sign. He was placed under a gag order and could still be court-martialed or removed from the Air Force.
In an unprecedented act of dissent, active-duty USAF Major Jason Watson was arrested on the Capitol steps after calling for the impeachment & removal of Donald Trump. Risking his career to uphold his constitutional oath, his arrest marks a historic moment. ✊🏻✊🏿✊🏼✊🏾✊🏽#DemsUnited pic.twitter.com/quFmuxKxoQ
Watson is an active duty service member who is placing his 17-year Air Force career on the line for exercising his First Amendment right—and his lawyers think he’s very well become a target for it.
“Nothing that is worth doing is something that you can do for free. Everything that is worthwhile is going to cost something. It’s going to be hard, it’s going to require sacrifice,” Watson told Burnett. “So all that I could do was ask myself: ‘What’s the highest price that I’m willing to pay?’ And this is what I ultimately came up with.”
In the middle of showing off work on the new White House helipad, President Trump unveiled yet another construction project, previously unknown to the public.
Trump told reporters to join him on the building’s South Lawn Wednesday where he excitedly revealed that he replaced the asphalt on the White House’s driveway with white granite mined from California, CNN reports.
