President Trump enjoyed his inaugural parade so much he wanted more of them.
But today he canceled plans for a military parade this fall in Washington — a parade the military did not want — blaming local officials for inflating the costs and saying they “know a windfall when they see it.”
Washington’s mayor, Muriel Bowser, pushed back on Twitter, saying that she had “finally got thru” to the president to convey the “realities” of what it costs to stage events like military parades in the city.
Bowser put the number at $21.6 million, though the city’s costs are just a fraction of the total, with federal agencies also kicking in millions of dollars. A day earlier, the Pentagon said Trump’s parade to celebrate the military could be postponed to 2019, as officials acknowledged that the event could cost more than $90 million.
The parade, which was never widely embraced, was initially scheduled for Nov. 10 — Veterans Day weekend — of this year.