Visitors stand in the rain to watch “The Commandant's Own” U.S. Marine Drum and Bugle Corps perform during The Great American State Fair on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., U.S., June 28, 2026. REUTERS/Elizabeth Frantz
President Donald Trump's Great American State Fair on the National Mall has turned into a Washington punchline, and a firsthand account in Slate found the 16-day celebration earned the ribbing.
Slate writer Molly Olmstead visited expecting to find an overlooked upside but reported the opposite, calling the fair a flop marked by thin crowds and flimsy, temporary-looking construction. She wrote that "MAHA Monday," a nod to Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s Make America Healthy Again movement, relied on lectures rather than entertainment. One session featured Dr. Mehmet Oz interviewed by Dean Cain, the actor who played Superman in the 1990s, before an audience Olmstead put at roughly 50 people in 87-degree heat.
"Journalists love to find surprises and unconventional angles, so I aimed to go down to the fair and find something unexpected. It seemed possible those photos were a matter of off hours or poor angles or selective omission. But no, we can confidently report that the Great American State Fair is a big ol’ dud. And nothing made that clearer than the anemic display from its 'MAHA Monday,'" wrote Olmstead.
Federal agency booths pushed a partisan message, she wrote, including an Agriculture Department display topped by a poster of Trump declaring "America is back." Several musical acts, among them Martina McBride and Young MC, had pulled out before opening day over the event's political tone.
"Trump’s Great American State Fair made no attempt to emulate the most charming elements of fairs. It instead tried, limply, to spread a Trump rally across a 1.5-mile-long fairground, with some MAHA PowerPoints thrown in. As a result, it committed one of the worst crimes possible, in the eyes of President Trump: It made MAGA look boring," Olmstead concluded.
Trump opened the fair boasting: "As you know very well, a short time ago we were a dead country. We were dead. Now we're the hottest country anywhere in the world. We're respected by everybody. Nobody's laughing at us anymore."
But the brag comes asfans were filmed walking out of his kickoff speech.
After photos showed sparse turnout and breakdowns including power outages and a buckling replica arch, he pushed back on the crowd criticism on Truth Social:
"Do you think people appreciate what a fantastic job we did in building and operating the Great American State Fair at the National Mall, packed with happy people, and everybody loving it? Ask yourself this simple question, 'DO YOU THINK THAT OBUMA OR SLEEPY JOE BIDEN COULD HAVE DONE IT?' THE ANSWER IS NO!"
Freedom 250 says more than 150,000 people have attended. The fair runs through July 10.