Donald Trump has urged people to visit a statue installed in Washington, D.C., of a Founding Father who owned slaves.
In a post on Truth Social, the 80-year-old president celebrated that the statue of Caesar Rodney has a temporary new home in Freedom Plaza as part of an installation marking the nation’s 250th anniversary.
The equestrian statue of Rodney depicts his midnight ride through a thunderstorm from Dover, Delaware, to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to cast the deciding vote in July 1776 in favor of American independence at the Continental Congress.
The statue was originally installed in Wilmington, Delaware, on Independence Day in 1923. However, it was removed amid the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests following the murder of George Floyd. Wilmington officials said at the time that the statue of Rodney was taken down so the city could have an “overdue discussion” about the public display of historical figures amid the country’s “racial justice reform movement.”
“250 years ago, on the eve of America’s momentous vote for Independence, Caesar Rodney received word that he was urgently needed to break a deadlock among the Delegates to the Second Continental Congress. Although he suffered from asthma and facial cancer, Rodney immediately set forth on an 80-mile overnight journey by horseback from Dover, Delaware, to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania,” Trump posted on Truth Social.
“Enduring a raging thunderstorm, he arrived 250 years ago this very day, July 2, 1776, to cast his decisive vote and secure America’s glorious destiny of Freedom and Independence. An equestrian statue honoring Rodney’s key contribution now anchors Spirit of ’76 at Freedom Plaza, a new exhibition in Washington, D.C., honoring the heroes and martyrs of the American Revolution. Go and see!”
Dick Carter, chairman of Delaware’s Heritage Commission, previously told The New York Times that when Rodney was 17, he inherited his father’s 849-acre farm, which had as many as 200 slaves.
Among the Founding Fathers, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and Benjamin Franklin are also known to have owned slaves at some point in their lives.
During his second term, Trump has taken several steps to restore what he calls “truth and sanity” to American history by removing references that frame the nation’s past as “inherently racist, sexist, oppressive, or otherwise irredeemably flawed,” including removing references to slavery from federal sites.
The Trump administration has also taken steps to reverse decisions to remove Confederate paintings and monuments from public display.
In an October 2020 proclamation, Trump said the removal of Rodney’s statue from Wilmington was part of a “radical purge” of the country’s Founding Fathers that could result in Rodney’s legacy “being erased forever.”
Trump also referenced other installations at Freedom Plaza alongside Rodney’s statue.
The exhibit features 12 Soldiers of the Revolution, a collection of bronze statues depicting 12 Revolutionary War soldiers; a 23-foot-tall Spirit of Liberty statue; and the Prison Ship Martyrs Monument, which honors the nearly 12,000 Americans who died aboard British prison ships during the American Revolutionary War.
“As we prepare to celebrate the 250th Birthday of our beloved Country, these statues and monuments now stand prominently in the heart of our Nation’s Capital as a celebration of the 250-year Triumph of the American Spirit, which is now STRONGER, GREATER, and MORE GLORIOUS than ever before,” Trump posted.
