Celebrating American Freedom Means Celebrating Juneteenth

Writings on Juneteenth and its Significance for American Liberty

Compendium of links to my writings relevant the holiday celebrating the abolition of slavery.

President Trump Has a Message for Americans on the Iran Deal

What do we celebrate on Juneteenth?

The holiday marking slavery's end has always carried contradictions. In the Trump era, more so than ever

Juneteenth Special: Historian Clint Smith on Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America

We feature a special broadcast marking the Juneteenth federal holiday that commemorates the day in 1865 when enslaved people in Galveston, Texas, learned of their freedom more than two years after the Emancipation Proclamation. We begin with our 2021 interview with historian Clint Smith, originally aired a day after President Biden signed legislation to make Juneteenth the first new federal holiday since Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day. Smith is the author of How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America. “When I think of Juneteenth, part of what I think about is the both/andedness of it,” Smith says, “that it is this moment in which we mourn the fact that freedom was kept from hundreds of thousands of enslaved people for years and for months after it had been attained by them, and then, at the same time, celebrating the end of one of the most egregious things that this country has ever done.” Smith says he recognizes the federal holiday marking Juneteenth as a symbol, “but it is clearly not enough.”

The US World Cup star who couldn't be an American under Trump's plan

Folarin Balogun scored two goals on his World Cup debut, but he is the type of person President Trump is trying to ban under birthright citizenship.

Why Trump can’t stop this Juneteenth for Black Americans

For Black Americans, Juneteenth is a love letter to their history of resistance, including to the president

The Juneteenth truth about Trump

In December 2025, Trump axed today’s holiday — Juneteenth, the official celebration of the Emancipation Proclamation — from the free admission days at the more than 100 national parks across America. He also axed Martin Luther King Jr. Day as a free admission day. Instead, he substituted his own birthday, June 14, as a free admission day. There you have it: the venal combination of Trump’s white supremacy and his malignant narcissism. It’s much the same with Trump’s celebration of America’s 250th birthday. He has erased any mention of the slavery that scarred most of America’s first century and of Jim Crow, during most of the next — and has instead merged the nation’s anniversary with his own 80th birthday. In 2020, Trump scheduled a campaign rally for himself on Juneteenth in Tulsa, Oklahoma — the site of the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre. (After a wave of criticism, he rescheduled it for the next day.) America can probably survive Trump’s malignant narcissism. It’s unclear how well we can endure his white supremacy. On May 21, Trump eased the regime’s cap on the number of refugees who can enter the United States by 10,000 slots — from 7,500 to 17,500 — all reserved for white South Africans. The ostensible reason: an “emergency … due to recent increases in the incitement of racially motivated violence on the part of the Government of South Africa.”Rubbish. According to investigative reporters in South Africa, such as Nechama Brodie, who has written extensively about farm murders there, white South Africans are not being persecuted. “Studies consistently show that white South Africans have the highest employment levels, highest education levels and highest income levels of all groups in South Africa, despite being a minority,” Brodie said.Trump’s advocacy for white Afrikaners is in sharp contrast to his dismantling of America’s refugee program for people of color (between 2004 and 2019, refugee allocations were divided among Africa, East Asia, Europe and Central Asia, Latin America/Caribbean, and Near East/South Asia). Trump has a long history of white supremacist activities, beginning with the 1973 lawsuit brought against Trump management for allegedly discriminating against Black renters. He took out full-page ads in 1989 calling for the death penalty for the five Black and Latino teenagers eventually exonerated in the Central Park jogger case.Trump played a major role in spreading the debunked, racially charged conspiracy theory that Barack Obama was not born in the United States. He infamously said there were “fine people on both sides” of the violent white supremacist rally in Charlottesville. He has hosted prominent white nationalist Nick Fuentes at his Mar-a-Lago residence. He has sought to erase Black history from America’s classrooms. He’s eliminated all government diversity, equity, and inclusion programs and is trying to stop them in the private sector. On this Juneteenth, it is important to acknowledge — both in sadness and in outrage — that the person occupying the position of president of the United States is a white supremacist.Robert Reich is a professor of public policy at Berkeley and former secretary of labor. His writings can be found at https://robertreich.substack.com/

How and why algae clouded Trump's vision for an 'American flag blue' Reflecting Pool

The shallow, sunny waters of the reflecting pool are an ideal incubator for algae growth in the summertime. Experts say the recent renovation may have helped accelerate it.