President Donald Trump has so far not recognized Martin Luther King Jr. Day through any official channels, and instead railed against alleged election fraud on his Truth Social account.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the trailblazing civil rights activist who was assassinated 56 years ago, is honored on the federal holiday on the third Monday of January each year.
The occasion has been marked by Trump’s predecessors, himself included, for nearly 40 years and began with former President Ronald Reagan in November 1983 after he signed the King Holiday Bill into law. During his first term, Trump issued proclamations for MLK Day every year from 2018 through 2021 — though he was criticized for spending the holiday on the golf course in 2018. On the holiday in 2019, Trump laid a wreath at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial in Washington, D.C.
This year, Trump spent the holiday at Mar-a-Lago and is due to attend the National College Football Championship in Miami.
Trump’s lack of recognition for the holiday drew rebuke from many online.
“Is anyone surprised?” asked one account on X. “I’m surprised he didn’t issue an EO to permanently cancel MLK Day.”
The White House did not immediately respond to The Independent’s request for comment.
Trump’s apparent break with tradition follows his administration’s rollback of civil rights and racial justice initiatives in federal agencies, corporations and universities through a series of executive orders.
The official White House account was mostly posting Monday about Immigration and Customs Enforcement crackdowns in Minnesota following mass protests in Minneapolis, while Trump complained about “rigged elections.”
“Rigged Elections are common in the U.S., with the Presidential Election of 2020 being the Granddaddy of them all,” he said on Truth Social. “WE DEMAND VOTER I.D.”
Under Trump, the National Park Service recently announced it will no longer offer free admission to parks on MLK Day and Juneteenth. Instead, it will offer free admission on Flag Day and Trump’s birthday.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom said his state was offering free entry at more than 200 parks in the Golden State “in honor” of King.
“Donald Trump scrapped free entry to National Parks on Martin Luther King Jr. Day and replaced it with his own birthday,” Newsom said. “California will not be following that path.”
“What more evidence do we need as to what the hell is going on in the United States of America?” Newsom added.
Others blasted the president on social media for failing to publicly acknowledge King.
“Trump is the complete opposite of Martin Luther King Jr., & his actions go against absolutely everything that MLK fought so hard to achieve,” said another.
“I’m sure by this time next year MLK Day will no longer be a federal holiday! It will be renamed Donald Trump Day!” someone else posted.
Members of the King family spoke out against the Trump administration in the days leading up to the holiday.
Martin Luther King III, who is the son of the civil rights leader, told Axios that there has been a “coordinated effort to erase or rewrite parts of American history, especially Black history and the legacy of the Civil Rights Movement” since Trump returned to office.
“The level of attack is so great, it’s going to require a greater sense of coordination and strategy,” King’s youngest child, Bernice King, told The Washington Post. “That’s why it’s important for people to study my dad’s movement because they were very good at coordinating efforts across all their different campaigns.”
Trump recently said landmark civil rights protections ushered in during the 1960s have resulted in white people being treated “very badly.”
The president was interviewed earlier this month by The New York Times and was asked whether he believed civil rights protections that began in the 1960s with the passage of the Civil Rights Act “resulted ultimately in the discrimination against white men.”
“Well, I think that a lot of people were very badly treated,” Trump replied. “White people were very badly treated, where they did extremely well and they were not invited to go into a university or a college.”
