WASHINGTON President Donald Trump has hijacked what for decades had been a nonpolitical Independence Day celebration on the National Mall, packing his ticketed-event speech with political appointees and Republican donors.

The Republican National Committee has been offering major donors tickets to Trumps speech, as have political appointees at the White House and executive branch agencies.

Hes going to have tanks out there. Its going to be cool, joked one RNC fundraiser on condition of anonymity. He said he received an offer for the free tickets on Friday but did not request any. He wants to have a parade like they have in Moscow or China or North Korea.

Trump has been enamored of public displays of military might since he attended the Bastille Day festivities in Paris in 2017. His plan for a massive military parade last year was canceled after a Defense Department estimate became public showing that it would cost $92 million and damage the citys roads because of the weight of tanks and other equipment.

The current plans for Thursday do not include a parade, but Trump is still pushing for tanks or other military vehicles to be displayed on the National Mall, The Washington Post reported , even though their weight is liable to damage the grass and roads. Flyovers by military planes including Air Force One and the Navys Blue Angels squadron are also planned.

Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a New York University history professor and expert on fascism, said Trumps need to display military hardware is a feature of authoritarians throughout history. He needs to colonize our lives. He needs to colonize our public spaces, she said, adding that it was dismaying that the Pentagon this year failed to thwart Trumps impulses. The military has been domesticated. I think the will to resist him has evaporated.

Groups that advocate for government transparency and ethics, meanwhile, railed against the RNCs involvement.

This partisan appropriation of a public event is consistent with the record of an administration that has no regard for lines between personal or partisan interests and its public obligations, said Robert Weissman, president of Public Citizen, a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization.