In a Memorial Day post on his Truth Social platform on Monday, President Donald Trump marked the solemn occasion honouring America’s war dead by condemning his political opponents and perceived adversaries as “scum,” describing members of the federal judiciary as “USA hating” and “monsters,” and labelling his predecessor, former President Joe Biden, as “incompetent.”
The message, written in all capital letters and posted shortly before 7 a.m. ET, saw the president wishing a “Happy Memorial Day to all, including the scum that spent the last four years trying to destroy our country through warped radical left minds,” whom he blamed for illegal immigration into the country under Biden’s administration.
Trump went on to claim that 21 million people had entered the US illegally under the previous government — a figure not supported by US Customs and Border Protection data, as previously reported by CNN.
He attributed the influx of migrants to “an incompetent president” and accused “judges who are on a mission to keep murderers, drug dealers, rapists, gang members, and released prisoners from all over the world, in our country so they can rob, murder, and rape again,” of blocking his deportation efforts, asserting that criminal migrants are “protected by these USA hating judges who suffer from an ideology that is sick, and very dangerous for our country.”
In the United States, Memorial Day honours those who died while serving in the armed forces; owing to the grave significance of the holiday, it is largely considered inappropriate to wish someone a “Happy Memorial Day.”
Later on Monday, the president is scheduled to observe the holiday in a more traditional manner, travelling to Arlington National Cemetery in northern Virginia. There, he will lay a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier before delivering remarks from the cemetery’s amphitheatre.
During his first term, Trump generally stuck to prepared speeches when delivering his Memorial Day remarks. He participated in the ceremony at Arlington for the first three years of his presidency before it was relocated to Fort McHenry in Baltimore during the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020.
Trump’s Memorial Day message came two days after a politically charged commencement address at the US Military Academy at West Point, where the president combined customary advice to graduates with more overtly partisan themes.
In the speech, Trump highlighted his election victory last year and addressed some of his grievances regarding investigations into him. He wore a red “Make America Great Again” hat during the address.
He also told the graduating cadets they would be the first to serve in the “golden age” of the military, praising at length his efforts to eliminate diversity initiatives in the armed forces and criticising his predecessors for engaging in what he termed wars of choice.
“The job of the US armed forces is not to host drag shows, to transform foreign cultures (and) spread democracy to everybody around the world at the point of a gun,” he said. “The military’s job is to dominate any foe and annihilate any threat to America, anywhere, anytime and any place.”
In his speech, Trump also gave somewhat peculiar advice about not marrying “trophy wives,” citing an example of a friend who moved to Monte Carlo with a younger wife, only to later suffer financially when he lost his “momentum.” Trump offered this story as guidance to the graduates.
Trump has previously attracted criticism for inserting political messages into occasions and settings traditionally regarded as apolitical.
During his first term, he took to the then-social media platform Twitter in 2018 to wish Americans a “Happy Memorial Day!” writing, “Those who died for our great country would be very happy and proud at how well our country is doing today,” emphasising his own policy achievements rather than the sacrifice made by America’s armed services.
In August 2024, the US Army issued a rare rebuke after Trump’s campaign recorded a video while visiting Arlington National Cemetery gravesites of some of the service members killed during the US’ chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan. The Army stated that Trump and his staff “were made aware of federal laws, Army regulations, and DoD policies, which clearly prohibit political activities on cemetery grounds.”
At the time, the Trump campaign cited a statement from the Gold Star families he accompanied, claiming they gave his videographer and photographer permission to be there, although some footage from the visit showed graves of other US service members whose families had not granted permission.
The president initially posted a different version of Monday’s Memorial Day message but appears to have deleted the original (which contained minor grammatical errors) and reposted it again.