Who gets to define patriotism at 250?
Photo by Erik McGregor/LightRocket via Getty Images
By Michael Jones
America’s 250th birthday arrives next month and if President Donald Trump has his way, the celebration will be impossible to miss.
The White House-led Freedom 250 initiative envisions a patriotic showcase featuring a national state fair, a National Garden of American Heroes, major public events and other programming designed to commemorate the country’s semiquincentennial. The effort exists alongside the official America250 Commission, the bipartisan body created by Congress to coordinate the anniversary.
But beneath the fireworks, festivals and fanfare lies a political question that is becoming increasingly difficult to ignore: Who gets to define what it means to love America?
For Democrats, the challenge is particularly acute.
Many have spent much of the Trump era warning that democratic norms, voting rights and constitutional institutions are under strain. At the same time, they are approaching a milestone birthday for the country they insist is worth defending.
Republicans have long enjoyed an advantage on questions of patriotism and national identity. Trump and his allies frequently accuse Democrats of being anti-American, soft on law enforcement or insufficiently proud of the country. Democrats reject those characterizations, but America 250 presents an opportunity to do more than rebut them.
It gives them a chance to offer their own vision.
Rep. Veronica Escobar (D-Texas) told me the anniversary should serve as a reminder of the ideals that launched the American experiment.
“One of the things that’s been so alarming to me is how many Americans have forgotten why we started this great experiment,” she said. “This anniversary is a really important moment for us to remind constituents and fellow Americans why America should take a look at our roots.”
Escobar acknowledged the nation’s founding contradictions, pointing to slavery and other injustices that shaped its early history. But she argued that those realities strengthen rather than weaken the case for celebration.
“This is a country worth fighting for,” she said. “And the ideals it was founded on are worth fighting for.”
That sentiment surfaced repeatedly in conversations with Democratic lawmakers. They framed patriotism less as loyalty to a political leader and more as a commitment to democratic participation and the country’s unfinished promise.
For Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D-Calif.), that connection begins at the nation’s founding.
“America was founded because of dissent,” she said. “It’s part of the fabric of democracy, but also this country.”
In her view, disagreement is not evidence of disloyalty. It is evidence that democracy is functioning as intended.
“Democracy means that you have a voice that you can use,” she said.
That perspective stands in sharp contrast to a political environment in which criticism of government policy is often portrayed as criticism of the country itself.
Escobar pointed to the aftermath of the January 6 attack on the Capitol.
She recalled returning to the House floor that night to certify the 2020 election after rioters assaulted police officers and breached the building.
“We said we’re not going to let them stop us,” she said.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) put it more directly when I asked how Democrats can celebrate America 250 while continuing to warn about what they view as threats posed by Trump and the MAGA movement.
“It’s not about one man. It’s not about the current occupant of the White House,” Jeffries told me. “It’s about the country, our journey, and the American people.”
Jeffries said House Democrats are already participating in America 250 events and plan to continue doing so in the weeks ahead.
He pointed to the opening of the Obama Presidential Center on Chicago’s South Side this week as another marker of what he sees as the continuing evolution of the American story.
“The framers didn’t give us a perfect country,” he said. “But they gave us a march toward a more perfect union.”
Rep. Marc Veasey (D-Texas) described the anniversary as both a celebration and a challenge.
“We’re celebrating 250 years of democracy,” he said. “But we’re also trying to figure out how we can make that democracy a more perfect democracy.”
Veasey pointed to some of the country’s darkest chapters, including slavery and Jim Crow, as evidence that American democracy has never been static. Progress, he argued, has depended on citizens demanding that the nation live up to its promises.
Sen. Andy Kim (D-N.J.) framed the anniversary in similarly forward-looking terms. “We should be doing everything possible to just celebrate,” he told me.
But he quickly added that the occasion should be about more than parades and fireworks.
“It’s also about rededicating ourselves to the values of this country from 250 years ago and ensuring that those values are leading us for the next 250 years,” he said.
Kim said the country needs a renewed commitment to public service and civic engagement, invoking President John F. Kennedy’s famous call to citizenship nearly 65 years ago.
Of course, not everyone is approaching America’s 250th birthday in a celebratory mood.
For many Americans, the anniversary arrives amid deep political polarization, declining trust in institutions and genuine fears about the country’s future. For some, patriotism feels less straightforward than it once did.
Yet after listening to Democrats describe the moment, I was struck by how rarely they talked about patriotism as pride alone.
Instead, they talked about responsibility. They talked about voting. Public service. Dissent. Defending democratic institutions. Telling the truth about the country’s failures while refusing to give up on its promise.
In other words, they described patriotism not as a feeling but as a practice.
Whether Americans embrace that vision remains to be seen. But as the country approaches its 250th birthday, perhaps the more revealing question isn’t whether Americans feel proud of their country. It’s whether they still believe the American experiment is worth participating in.
The Democrats I spoke with clearly do.
Michael Jones is an independent Capitol Hill correspondent and contributor for COURIER. He is the author of Once Upon a Hill, a newsletter about Congressional politics.
