President Donald Trump criticized the number of US holidays and said they cost the country billions.
The post was made on Juneteenth, a federal holiday that Trump previously supported.
Joe Biden later said making it a federal holiday was “one of the proudest moments of my presidency.”
Joe Biden has reiterated his support for Juneteenth as a federal holiday, after President Donald Trump said America had “too many” of them.
“Too many non-working holidays in America,” Trump wrote on Truth Social late Thursday. “It is costing our Country $BILLIONS OF DOLLARS to keep all of these businesses closed.”
The president said that the frequency of holidays “must change” and that workers didn’t want them.
“The workers don’t want it either!” he continued. “Soon we’ll end up having a holiday for every once working day of the year. It must change if we are going to, MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”
Juneteenth, held on June 19 every year, commemorates the end of slavery in the United States and has long been celebrated by Black Americans.
It became the 11th federal holiday in 2021 with a law signed by then-President Joe Biden. The bill passed with broad bipartisan support, receiving unanimous approval in the Senate and all but 14 votes in the House of Representatives.
After Trump’s Truth Social post, Biden said on X that he’d celebrated the day in Texas and that making Juneteenth a federal holiday was “one of the proudest moments of my presidency.”
“It’s a day of liberation. It’s a day of remembrance. And it’s a day of celebration. Today, it was an honor to be in Galveston where freedom rang out 160 years ago,” he said.
The White House press office didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment from Business Insider regarding Trump’s post.
Most federal offices, such as the US Postal Service, are closed during Juneteenth. Markets such as the Nasdaq and New York Stock Exchange don’t trade during the holiday, either.
But whether private companies and state governments remain open varies. Most major banks are closed for the holiday, but not all companies provide paid time off.
Earlier on Thursday, the White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, said at a press briefing that the White House was open. When asked by a journalist about commemorating Juneteenth, she said she was “not tracking” Trump’s signature on any proclamations for the holiday.
“I know this is a federal holiday,” she said. “I want to thank all of you for showing up to work. We are certainly here. We’re working 24/7 right now.”
Trump himself supported making Juneteenth a federal holiday in the wake of widespread protests following the killing of George Floyd. “Make Juneteenth a National Holiday” was included among his “Promise to Black America over 4 years” policy proposals in his 2020 presidential campaign.
During that campaign, Trump took credit for publicizing Juneteenth after moving one of his rallies from June 19 to June 20 in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
“I did something good: I made Juneteenth very famous,” Trump told The Wall Street Journal at the time. “It’s actually an important event, an important time. But nobody had ever heard of it.”
In the same interview, Trump expressed surprise that his administration had commemorated Juneteenth every year.
“Oh really? We put out a statement? The Trump White House put out a statement?” he said, according to the Journal. “OK, OK. Good.”
The White House didn’t publish a statement on its website commemorating Juneteenth this year.
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