By Michelle L. Price and Lolita C. Baldor
Washington (AP) – Trump administration has early discussions on a large military parade in the national capital this summer, which is a long -standing dream from President Donald Trump.
The mayor of DC, Muriel Bowser, said on Monday that the administration had contacted the city to hold a parade on June 14 which would extend from Arlington, Virginia, where the national cemetery of the Pentagon and Arlington is located, through the Potomac river and Washington, DC, DC,
The army is in the first discussions on the addition of a parade at the 250th army anniversary festival, which is held on June 14, according to a defense official who spoke under the guise of anonymity because the discussions are underway and no decision has been made.
June 14 is also Trump’s 79th anniversary.
The White House in a statement said that “no military parade has been planned.”
The army’s anniversary festival, which has been in the planning phase for about two years, must include a range of activities and presentations on the National Mall, including army, humve, helicopter and other equipment armored vehicles.
In a statement, Colonel David Butler, an army spokesman, said that “he is too early to say whether we have a parade or not, but we work with the White House as well as several government agencies to make the celebration an event at the national level.”
Trump in his first mandate proposed to have a great military parade in the United States after watching one in France the Bastille Day in 2017. Trump said after watching the two-hour procession along the famous Champs-Elyses that he wanted a bigger Washington on Pennsylvania Avenue.
But the event has never taken place because of the high costs expected, with an estimate of a price of $ 92 million and logistical shortcuts.
Trump in 2018 declared in an article on the social media site then known as Twitter that he canceled the event on costs and accused local price politicians.
“When we asked them to give us a price to organize a large party military parade, they wanted a number so ridiculously high that I canceled it,” he said in his post.
Bowser, speaking at a press conference on Monday, said that she did not know if the event was “characterized as a military parade”, but said that military tanks rolling in the streets of the city “would not be good”.
“If military tanks were used, they should be accompanied by several million dollars to repair the roads,” she said.
Takis Karantonis, chairman of the Board of Directors of the County Arlington, said in a statement that the secret services had contacted the county on Friday “concerning the possibility of a military parade to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the American army, but no other details were proposed”.
Karantonis said that it was not clear what would be the scope of the parade, but said: “I hope that the federal government will remain sensitive to pain and concerns of many military residents and active veterans, who have lost or could lose their jobs in recent federal decisions, because they are thinking best of celebrating the anniversary of the army.”
Although Bowser was more factual in his remarks on Monday, the Columbia district had publicly published the idea of a military parade during Trump’s first term.
The official DC council account on X declared in a January 2019 article on the winter conditions that the schools and government offices would always open in time, but then added: “The parade of giant tanks: still canceled.”
Months later, in June 2019, the account published a service note from the Ministry of Defense to show that the army opposed the use of tanks in the streets of the city.
On Sunday, the latest parade plans were reported by Washington City Paper.
The writer Associated Press Ashraf Khalil contributed to this report.
Originally published:
California Daily Newspapers
