The Three R’s of June 14th
Respect the Military, Raise Your Voice, and Rattle the Regime
June 14 is Flag Day, the anniversary of 250 years of the US Army, and … um… President Trump’s 79th birthday.
We don’t need to let President’s Trump birthday interfere with celebrating Flag Day1 or the 250th Birthday of the US Army2, despite the planned parade and his involvement.
As a kid, Flag Day for me was one of those sleepy early summer semi-holidays, with a small parade and bbqs, in the rural New York village where I grew up.
My uncle drove his blue convertible behind the red antique firetruck, waving, and my sisters wore yellow chiffony dresses and ran around with grape sodas. In shorts and bare feet, I swatted away mosquitoes and wondered what it was all about.
Respect the Military
What we can do is this: celebrate the heck out of the US Military, because it is one branch of the United States of America that is sworn to protect the Constitution and nothing else.
It is vitally important to recognize that if you’re an activist against the Trump Administration, you want to have the US military on your side now and in the future.
If you choose to demonstrate in Washington, DC, snub Trump by carrying signs that don’t recognize him at all, but rather point to the enduring message that the military is there to protect the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic.
I’ve been with soldiers, and 90% of them are dignified, well-trained individuals who understand that the military is sworn to use its lethality in protection of Americans and its missions. Whatever your feelings about the military, please separate them from other paramilitary activities currently underway by ICE – they are very different entities.
Every soldier took an oath, and soldiers take these vows seriously.3
Witness how retired General Milley spoke about the military’s mission two years ago, after serving as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff under both Trump and Biden:
Notice how the Army website says nothing about President Trump on its page announcing the 250th Birthday celebration:
Notice too how Army websites include what seem to be sly digs against Trump policies, especially around DEI. Check out this landing page on the Army history site, for example:
Contrast it with the letter the Army received from the Administration regarding DEI policies:
(The actual letter is linked on the Army website, here).
Notice how the online calendar of the US Army includes Juneteenth4:
In short, be friends with the US Army.
But if you do go to Washington, encourage everyone you know NOT to go to the events or parts of the day in which the President will be attending. Here’s what the event is supposed to look like:
Registration for the Festival & Parade is available through America250's event registration portal. Admission is free and open to the public but registration will allow you to get through security quicker.5
Raise your Voice
Carry signs with messages like these:
[The photos in the collage above were snapped from this Etsy site, with which we are not in any way affiliated.]
Make sure every soldier sees them.
Celebrate THEM – don’t hold signs that put down Trump.
Make Trump secondary to the parade and events. Use signs that don’t reference him at all. He hates being ignored.
Other sign ideas:
“Ignore the President”
“We Love You for Protecting the Constitution”
“Thank you for protecting Liberty and Justice for ALL of us”
“To The US Army: We Celebrate Your Diversity and Strength”
Rattle the Regime
You don’t need a reservation to attend to attend the Washington, DC events, so don’t worry about signing up in advance or sharing your cell phone on the reservation system posted here.
However, you could try using that reservation system in a way intended to interfere with its functioning, in the way TikTok users acquired hundreds of tickets to a Trump event in the past, and didn’t use them. 6
Purpose:
Acquire as many tickets to the parade as possible (which will not be used)
Simple sabotage: slow down the machinery of government (in this case, whatever electronic systems are working to process ticket distribution)
Annoy anyone in power who is involved in the ticket processing
Rattle the regime.
This kind of interference could proceed like this:
Obtain several cell phone numbers and email addresses that you could use to register on the ticket system. The system sends a text message to the phone number in order to confirm your registration. You could use a burner phone or your own phone to do this. The system allows you to acquire only two tickets per registration. Therefore, if possible, try to use as many phones/emails as you can.
Even if you just make the registration attempt and don’t confirm, you are interfering with the regime’s electronic functioning in a small way. Many small acts will add up.
If you’re of a mischievous mind, you could use the contact information of people on your personal black list.
You could also use the contact information of public people, such as:
all the journalists at the Bezos-owned Washington Post,7
any MAGA supporters,
DOGE phone numbers and emails,
Phone numbers and addresses/emails of all pillars of support people and THEIR pillars of support (such as friends and family of Kristi Noem)
The contact information for people who would never support MAGA and who don’t mind being contacted because they won’t go
Anyone else willing to host a cell phone and email address that could be a throw-away phone number, a Google voice number, or other disposable email and phone number, and
The cell phone numbers of any spam numbers you’ve received from trolls in China or Russia or Nigeria begging you for money.
What if a million tickets are “sold” … and no one shows up?
Please contact me for more detailed contact information for DOGE members, MAGA supporters, and more examples of the human capital in Trump’s pillars of support.
Other Options for Rattling the Regime in Washington DC
If you’re in DC, support the restaurants and businesses that were recently targeted by ICE8, and/or boycott or parade outside any popular MAGA hangouts.
If you’re intent on going to the parade, make your presence known. Any way in which you can interfere with its functioning is useful.
Again, explore the intention to support the military and IGNORE and/or IRRITATE President Trump.
Study the parade route below. Consider what will serve in the best interests of the American people in the moment, as nonviolently as possible.
Don’t think about blowing up a bridge.
But do wonder about other things:
What if there was a major water pipe or sewer leakage on the parade route?
What if, somehow, a sinkhole-sized pothole or two or three appeared on the parade route the day before?
What if a thousand eggs were launched by slingshots in wonderful arcing parabolas at the ground in front of the platform where Trump intends to be? A thousand eggs that symbolize the chicken that Trump truly is?
Create a two-sided sign. One side of your sign faces the military, celebrating it, with positive slogans as above. The back side of the sign says “TACO” with a picture of Trump dressed as a chicken.
Stand in front of a tank.
You don’t have forever to live.
Footnotes
In 1916, President Woodrow Wilson issued a presidential proclamation that designated June 14 as Flag Day.[4] On August 3, 1949, National Flag Day was officially established by an Act of Congress.[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_Day_(United_States)
Ten companies of riflemen were authorized by a resolution of the Continental Congress on 14 June 1775. However, the oldest Regular Army infantry regiment, the 3d, was constituted on 3 June 1784, as the First American Regiment.
Army Values: https://www.army.mil/values/index.html
Juneteenth is a federal holiday in the United States. It is celebrated annually on June 19 to commemorate the ending of slavery in the United States.
Admission is free and open to the public but registration will allow you to get through security quicker. https://www.army.mil/1775/events.html#lbbdaynationalmall
TikTok users and fans of Korean pop music groups claimed to have registered potentially hundreds of thousands of tickets for Mr. Trump’s campaign rally as a prank. After the Trump campaign’s official account @TeamTrump posted a tweet asking supporters to register for free tickets using their phones on June 11, K-pop fan accounts began sharing the information with followers, encouraging them to register for the rally — and then not show. (New York Times, 2020)
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And:
Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents began targeting DC restaurants on Tuesday in what is shaping up to be one of the city’s most high-profile examples yet of President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown. Millie’s in Spring Valley, Pupatella in Dupont Circle, Chef Geoff’s in Northwest, Chang Chang downtown, and Ghostburger in Shaw are among the businesses that immigration officials have visited seeking I-9 forms verifying employment eligibility. More than 100 DC-area businesses received “inspection” notices, according to ICE. The agency says no arrests were made as part of these “worksite enforcement operations.” (https://www.washingtonian.com/2025/05/06/ice-agents-are-targeting-dc-restaurants/)