Juneteenth

Believe it or not, France has had a form of social security since the 1600s, and its modern system began in earnest in 1910, when the world’s life expectancy was just 32 years old. Today the average human makes it to 75 and for the French, it’s 83, among the highest in Europe.

Great news for French people, bad news for their pensions.

Because people are living longer, the math to fund pensions in France is no longer mathing, and now the country’s debt is nearly 114% of its GDP. Remember it was just a couple of years ago when protesters set parts of Paris on fire because President Emmanuel Macron proposed raising the age of legal retirement from 62 to 64. Well, now Prime Minister Francois Bayrou has proposed eliminating two national holidays, in an attempt to address the country’s debt.

In 2023, before Paris was burning, roughly 50,000 people in Denmark gathered outside of Parliament to express their anger over ditching one of the country’s national holidays. The roots of Great Prayer Day date all the way back to the 1600s. Eliminating it — with the hopes of increasing production and tax revenue — brought together the unions, opposing political parties and churches in a rare trifecta. That explains why a number of schools and businesses closed for the holiday in 2024 in defiance of the official change.

This week, Bayrou proposed eliminating France’s Easter Monday and Victory Day holidays, the latter marking the defeat of Nazi Germany. In a Reuters poll, 70% of respondents didn’t like the idea, so we’ll see if Paris starts burning again. Or maybe citizens will take a cue from the Danes and just not work on those days, even if the government decides to continue business as usual.

Here at home, President Trump has also floated the idea of eliminating one of the national holidays. However, because he floated the idea on Juneteenth — via a social media post about “too many non-working holidays” — I’m going to assume tax revenue wasn’t the sole motivation for his comments that day. You know, given his crusade against corporate and government diversity efforts; his refusal to apologize for calling for the death penalty for five innocent boys of color; and his approval of Alligator Alcatraz. However, while I find myself at odds with the president’s 2025 remarks about the holiday, I do agree with what he said about Juneteenth when he was president in 2020: “It’s actually an important event, an important time.”

Indeed.

While the institution of slavery enabled this country to quickly become a global power, studies show the largest economic gains in the history of the country came from slavery’s ending — otherwise known as Juneteenth. Two economists have found that the economic payoff from freeing enslaved people was “bigger than the introduction of railroads, by some estimates, and worth 7 to 60 years of technological innovation in the latter half of the 19th century,” according to the University of Chicago. Why? Because the final calculations revealed the cost to enslave people for centuries was far greater than the economic benefit of their freedom.

In 1492, when Christopher Columbus “discovered America,” civilizations had been thriving on this land for millennia. The colonizers introduced slavery to these shores two years before the first “Thanksgiving” in 1621. That was more than 50 years before King Louis XIV started France’s first pension; 60 years before King Christian V approved Great Prayer Day; and 157 years before the 13 colonies declared independence from Britain on July 4, 1776.

Of all the national holidays around the Western world, it would appear Juneteenth is among the most significant historically. Yet it gained federal recognition just four years ago, and it remains vulnerable. The transatlantic slave trade transformed the global economy, but the numbers show it was Juneteenth that lifted America to the top. Which tells you the president’s hint at its elimination has little to do with our greatness and everything to do with the worldview of an elected official who was endorsed by the newspaper of the Ku Klux Klan.

If it does get to the point where we — like France and Denmark — end up seriously considering cutting a holiday, my vote is for Thanksgiving. The retail industry treats it like a speed bump between Halloween and Christmas, and when history retells its origins, it’s not a holiday worth protesting to keep.

YouTube: @LZGrandersonShow

WASHINGTON — President Trump honored Juneteenth in each of his first four years as president, even before it became a federal holiday. He even claimed once to have made it “famous.”

But on this year’s Juneteenth holiday on Thursday, the usually talkative president kept silent about a day important to Black Americans for marking the end of slavery in the country he leads again.

No words about it from his lips, on paper or through his social media site.

Asked whether Trump would commemorate Juneteenth in any way, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters: “I’m not tracking his signature on a proclamation today. I know this is a federal holiday. I want to thank all of you for showing up to work. We are certainly here. We’re working 24/7 right now.”

Asked in a follow-up question whether Trump might recognize the occasion another way or on another day, Leavitt said, “I just answered that question for you.”

Trump’s silence was a sharp contrast from his prior acknowledgment of the holiday. Juneteenth celebrates the end of slavery in the United States by commemorating June 19, 1865, when Union soldiers brought the news of freedom to enslaved Black people in Galveston, Texas. Their freedom came more than two years after President Abraham Lincoln liberated slaves in the Confederacy by signing the Emancipation Proclamation during the Civil War.

Trump’s quiet on the issue also deviated from White House guidance that Trump planned to sign a Juneteenth proclamation. Leavitt didn’t explain the change. Trump held no public events Thursday, but he shared statements about Iran, the TikTok app and Fed chairman Jerome Powell on his social media site.

He had more to say about Juneteenth in yearly statements in his first term.

In 2017, Trump invoked the “soulful festivities and emotional rejoicing” that swept through the Galveston crowd when a major general delivered the news that all enslaved people were free.

He told the Galveston story in each of the next three years. “Together, we honor the unbreakable spirit and countless contributions of generations of African Americans to the story of American greatness,” he added in his 2018 statement.

In 2019: “Across our country, the contributions of African Americans continue to enrich every facet of American life.”

In 2020: “June reminds us of both the unimaginable injustice of slavery and the incomparable joy that must have attended emancipation. It is both a remembrance of a blight on our history and a celebration of our Nation’s unsurpassed ability to triumph over darkness.”

In 2020, after suspending his campaign rallies because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Trump chose Tulsa, Okla., as the place to resume his public gatherings, and scheduled a rally for June 19. But the decision met with such fierce criticism that Trump postponed the event by a day.

Black leaders had said it was offensive for Trump to choose June 19 and Tulsa for a campaign event, given the significance of Juneteenth and Tulsa being the place where, in 1921, a white mob looted and burned that city’s Greenwood district, an economically thriving area referred to as Black Wall Street. As many as 300 Black Tulsans were killed, and thousands were temporarily held in internment camps overseen by the National Guard.

In an interview with the Wall Street Journal days before the rally, Trump tried to put a positive spin on the situation by claiming that he had made Juneteenth “famous.” He said he changed the rally date out of respect for two African American friends and supporters.

“I did something good. I made it famous. I made Juneteenth very famous,” Trump said. “It’s actually an important event, it’s an important time. But nobody had heard of it. Very few people have heard of it.”

Generations of Black Americans celebrated Juneteenth long before it became a federal holiday in 2021 with the stroke of former President Joe Biden’s pen.

Later in 2020, Trump sought to woo Black voters with a series of campaign promises, including establishing Juneteenth as a federal holiday.

He lost the election, and that made it possible for Biden to sign the legislation establishing Juneteenth as the newest federal holiday.

Last year, Biden spoke briefly at a holiday concert on the South Lawn that featured performances by Gladys Knight and Patti LaBelle. Former Vice President Kamala Harris danced onstage with gospel singer Kirk Franklin.

Biden was spending this year’s holiday in Galveston, Texas, where he was set to speak at a historic African Methodist Episcopal church.

Superville writes for the Associated Press. AP writer Calvin Woodward contributed to this report.

AUSTIN, Texas — Juneteenth celebrations have been scaled back this year due to funding shortfalls as companies and municipalities across the country reconsider their support for diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives.

Canceled federal grants and businesses moving away from so-called brand activism have hit the bottom line of parades and other events heading into Thursday’s federal holiday, which celebrates the end of slavery in the United States. The shrinking financial support coincides with many companies severing ties with LGBTQ+ celebrations for Pride this year and President Trump’s efforts to squash DEI programs throughout the federal government.

In Denver, for example, more than a dozen companies backed out of supporting the Juneteenth Music Festival, which is one of the city’s biggest celebrations of the holiday, according to Norman Harris, executive director of JMF Corporation, which puts on the event.

“There were quite a few sponsors who pulled back their investments or let us know they couldn’t or wouldn’t be in a position to support this year,” said Harris, who has overseen the event for more than a decade.

The festival, which takes place in the historically Black Five Points neighborhood, has been scaled back to one day instead of two because of the budget shortfall. It has only been able to stay afloat thanks to donations from individuals and foundations.

“Thankfully, there was a wide range of support that came when we made the announcement that the celebration is in jeopardy,” Harris said.

Juneteenth celebrates the day the last enslaved people in Texas were told they were free on June 19, 1865, two years after President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation. The day has been celebrated by Black Americans for generations, including in Harris’ family, but became more widely celebrated after becoming a federal holiday in 2021.

After the 2020 murder of George Floyd, many companies pursued efforts to make their branding more inclusive, but it has slowed down over the last few years after some received blowback from conservatives and because many companies didn’t see it as an important part of their revenue stream, said Dionne Nickerson, a marketing professor at Emory University.

Some companies can no longer afford to support Juneteenth celebrations because they just don’t have the money given the economic uncertainty, according to Sonya Grier, a marketing professor at American University.

“It’s a whole confluence of issues,” Grier said.

Rollback of local support

Many state and local governments hold or help fund celebrations, but some decided not to this year.

The governor’s office in West Virginia stated that the state won’t be hosting any Juneteenth events this year for the first time since 2017 due to a budget deficit. Republican Gov. Patrick Morrisey last month signed a bill to end all diversity programs.

“Due to the continued fiscal challenges facing West Virginia, state government will not be sponsoring any formal activities,” Deputy Press Secretary Drew Galang said in an email.

City Council members in Scottsdale, Ariz., dissolved their DEI office in February, leading to the cancellation of the city’s annual Juneteenth festival.

Event organizers in Colorado Springs, Colo., had to move locations due to fewer sponsors and cuts in city funding, said Jennifer Smith, a planner for the Southern Colorado Juneteenth Festival.

Around five companies sponsored the event this year, compared to dozens in years prior, Smith said.

“They have said their budgets have been cut because of DEI,” and that they can no longer afford it, she said.

Some groups have also mentioned safety concerns. Planners in Bend, Ore., cited “an increasingly volatile political climate” in a statement about why they canceled this year’s celebration.

Slashes in federal funding

Many local organizations have also had their budgets slashed after the National Endowment for the Arts pulled funding for numerous grants in May.

The Cooper Family Foundation throws one of the largest Juneteenth celebrations in San Diego each year. It was one of dozens of groups told by the NEA in May that its $25,000 grant was being rescinded.

The email said the event no longer aligned with the agency’s priorities, said Maliya Jones, who works for the foundation.

The grant money went toward paying for arts and dance performers. The event will still take place this year, but members of the Cooper family will have to divide up covering the costs, said Marla Cooper, who leads the foundation.

“That’s $25,000 we have to figure out how we’re going to pay for,” Cooper said.

“We will always have Juneteenth,” she said. “And we will work it out.”

Lathan writes for the Associated Press.