Biden approved modest festival, not large-scale military parade, for U.S. Army’s 250th birthday

Claim:

Former President Joe Biden’s administration approved a permit application the U.S. Army filed in June 2024 for a military parade celebrating its 250th birthday.

Rating:

What’s True

The U.S. Army Military District of Washington filed a permit application for a festival celebrating the Army’s 250th birthday in June 2024, during the Biden administration.

What’s False

The Army’s 2024 permit application described a festival, not a parade, with a maximum of only 300 military personnel and civilians in attendance. A separate permit for a much larger celebration — the military parade that happened on June 14, 2025 — was filed under Trump’s administration in March 2025. Both the festival and the parade took place in celebration of the Army’s 250th birthday.

In mid-June 2025, a claim spread online that former U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration first approved the military parade held during President Donald Trump’s second term on June 14, 2025.

Rumors about the Biden administration’s role in crafting the parade, which marked the U.S. Army’s 250th anniversary — a date that happened to coincide with Trump’s 79th birthday — spread on X, Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn. Many of these claims shared an image alleging the Army first filed a permit application for a “grand parade” in June 2024, when Biden was still in office. Meanwhile, Snopes readers searched the website with inquiries like “did Biden approve the military parade.”

It is true that one of the Army’s direct reports, the U.S. Army Military District of Washington, filed a permit application in June 2024 — under Biden’s administration — for a festival celebrating the Army’s 250th birthday. However, this permit application described a much smaller event, nowhere near the size of Trump’s “grand parade.” In fact, the military parade involved a separate permit application, filed in March 2025, two months after Trump started his second term in office.

Furthermore, both events — the festival approved under Biden and the military parade approved under Trump — separately took place on the Army’s 250th birthday, confirmed Mike Litterst, a spokesperson for the National Mall and Memorial Parks under the National Parks Service, whose Division of Permits Management officially approves these applications.

“There were two separate permitted events celebrating the Army’s 250th birthday on the National Mall that took place on Saturday, June 14, 2025,” Litterst wrote in an email. “The first was a festival on the Mall, for which an application was submitted on June 13, 2024; the second was the military parade, which submitted an application on March 30, 2025.”

The Army’s news release on its 250th birthday celebration also described a festival on the National Mall — although the event appeared to expand past the original permit application’s description from 2024 — followed by a military parade.

Thus, as Biden’s administration did intend to celebrate the Army’s 250th birthday, but did not plan on a military parade, we rate this claim a mixture of truth and falsehood.

The two permits

Litterst provided copies of the two permit applications; the June 2024 application is available here, and the March 2025 document is available here. The first document listed the application date as June 12, 2024, while the second listed its application date as March 31, 2025 — in both cases, one day off from the dates Litterst mentioned in his email. (It was unclear whether Litterst misspoke or if the application dates listed differed from the actual dates on which they were submitted. We reached out for clarification and await a response.)

The first permit application described an event including a maximum of 300 soldiers and civilian personnel — a far cry from the 6,700 soldiers in uniform who participated in the military parade, per the Army’s news release. The equipment list for the festival included 120 chairs, four cannons, musical equipment and technical equipment.

In contrast, Trump’s event included bleachers, fireworks, horses, a parachute demonstration, a 21-gun salute and an array of armored military vehicles, including tanks, planes, helicopters and other armored military equipment. The 2025 application listed 250 volunteers to greet and guide guests on Page 3, whereas the 2024 permit application listed zero (see Page 2).

Furthermore, the permit filed under Biden’s administration proposed the following events on Page 2: a “concert by The United States Army Band, musical ensemble performances by the US Army Band & US Army Field Band, performances by the US Army Drill Team, Old Guard Fife & Drum Corps and equipment/soldier displays by the 3rd Infantry Regiment and the Presidential Salute Battery.” Under a question about whether any road closures or traffic management would be required, the permit applicant, a project manager with the U.S. Army Military District of Washington named Paul A. Hadwiger, checked “No.”

Highlighted key passages from a 2024 permit application for a festival celebrating the U.S. Army’s 250th birthday demonstrating the planned size and scope of the event. (Mike Litterst/National Mall and Memorial Parks/Snopes illustration)

In other words, at no point does the permit application filed under Biden’s administration describe a military parade, nor does it describe an event on par with Trump’s parade.

In contrast, the March 2025 permit application repeatedly used the word “parade.” The schedule on Page 2 included the parade’s procession through multiple streets, the fact the parade will “consist of a history of the U.S. Army,” the parachute demonstration, an aircraft flyover, five to seven musical acts from “well known performers, likely from the country music world” and the fireworks display.

Under the question about road closures and traffic management on Page 2, the permit applicant, former Trump aide Megan Powers, responded “Yes” and listed multiple streets, as well as the Arlington Memorial Bridge. Powers filed the application on behalf of America250, a nonpartisan group helping to organize commemoration of the United States’ 250th birthday in tandem with a commission established by the U.S. Congress.

Highlighted key passages from the March 2025 permit application demonstrating the planned size and scope of the military parade celebrating the U.S. Army’s 250th birthday that occurred on June 14, 2025. (Mike Litterst/National Mall and Memorial Parks/Snopes illustration)

In sum: The 2024 permit application clearly described a modest festival, whereas Trump’s 2025 permit application described a large-scale military parade. Both events took place, further demonstrating that the two events celebrating the U.S. Army’s 250th birthday were separate and that Biden’s administration did not originally approve the permit application for Trump’s military parade.

Snopes previously examined claims that Trump was planning a military parade in 2019 and that a Craigslist ad sought seat fillers for the 2025 parade.

Sources