Although there was always going to be some kind of wide exultation of conservative-minded nationalism timed to this year’s American semiquincentennial—planning for the event has been running since 2016, and these big anniversaries are, by their very nature, catnip to any of a country’s more backwards-looking minds—Donald Trump has still worked hard to get his greasy thumbprints all over the big birthday bash. In some ways, that effort is working as steadily as the crews raising the shadow of a presidential UFC arena over the seat of American democracy at this very moment—but in other ways, not so much. Look, for instance, to the musical performance roster of the planned 16-day “Great American State Fair” event, which was announced yesterday, and which has since suffered several defections, once artists realized the show wouldn’t be quite as apolitical as they were promised.
Per CBS News, a number of artists announced to be on the bill for the Washington D.C. shows have very quickly dropped out, including Morris Day (“It’s a no for me”), Young MC (“I HAVE INFORMED MY AGENTS THAT I WILL NOT BE PERFORMING AT THE FREEDOM 250 EVENT”), and The Commodores (“Our music has always been our voice and we choose not to publicly affiliate with any single political party.”) Country music star Martina McBride also announced she was dropping out, as was Brett Michaels, who claimed the event “evolved into something much more divisive than what I agreed to be a part of.” Meanwhile, at least some of the performers associated with Milli Vanilli expressed confusion that the group’s name was even on the bill in the first place.
At issue here, apparently, is the event’s connection to Freedom 250, the White House’s Trump-backed taskforce for 250th anniversary celebrations, which is putting on the State Fair. Trump and his team have done a lot of work over the last two years (including glomming on to the existing America 250 group that grew out of legislation signed by Barack Obama) to make sure the semiquincentennial reflects Trump’s image and interests, from pushing for (illegal) commemorative money bearing Trump’s picture, to the planned UFC fights, to unofficially kicking off the celebrations with a Christian conservative prayer meeting. For better or for worse, that means any participation in said events is hard to extricate from support for its loudest organizer, shattering any veneer of bipartisanship the 250th previously might have had. At least some of the artists who dropped out sound like they got a bit hoodwinked by this—Young MC and McBride both said they’d been promised a “nonpartisan” event,” only to sound surprised when they found out they were performing at a Trump-planned show. But, hey: They’ve still got Vanilla Ice and C+C Music Factory, at least!
This story has been updated to include the withdrawal of Brett Michaels.
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