'A total disappointment': revelers face unbearable heat at Great American State Fair

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: The Guardian

Fri 3 Jul 2026 17.47 EDT
Last modified on Sat 4 Jul 2026 03.22 EDT


Even by Trumpian standards, the event was promoted with intense hyperbole: nothing short, the US president suggested, of the “the most unforgettable birthday party any country has ever seen”. “It’s gonna be great,” Donald Trump proclaimed on the opening night of the Great American State Fair, the centerpiece of the US 250th anniversary celebrations. “It’s gonna be unbelievable.”

In the heart of US capital, a small village of tented pavilions and marquees representing states and territories from across the US has taken over the National Mall. And on Friday morning Dave Forster, 63, was apparently struggling to believe his eyes. A “friggin​’ patriot” who had traveled from his home in Washington state to Washington DC to mark the milestone, Forster thought many of the state offerings “sucked”, he told the Guardian. “They’ve had how long? It’s just a total disappointment.”

It was unclear whether he had seen the two-dimensional cutout of a grand champion market goat in Nebraska’s pavilion; the toy Caterpillar industrial machines, in a sandpit inexplicably filled with corn, in Illinois; or the two giant dice in the corner of Nevada. As revelers turned up to explore the fair this weekend, however, the key draw of each state’s offering was not imagination or interactivity, but how much of an escape it offered from the blistering sun.

Temperatures are expected to exceed 100F (37.8C) in Washington amid a scorching blanket across the much of the US. Maybe this is what the president means when he declares it now to be the “hottest country in the world”. According to NBC Washington, more than a dozen people were treated for heat illness and injury at the state fair before it closed, and 11 people were taken to the hospital.

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jul/03/great-american-state-washington-dc

[chelsea0011]

1. Granted, this is an epic heat wave but,

it still is DC in the summer. It is still usually hot and not prepping for heat is typical Trump planning without any thinking.

[3Hotdogs]

2. I went to Steamtown in June to see Big Boy. It is run by the national park service. There were pallets of bottled water

that were GIVEN out. And they were opened and put in ice buckets when taken from the pallets.

It is possible to plan ahead

[dave99]

7. not gonna happen

[mcar]

9. In Scranton?

That's my hometown!

[3Hotdogs]

23. Yes.

[mcar]

24. My kids loved Steamtown when we visited

It's a great place!

[3Hotdogs]

25. Steamtown and the Lackawanna Coal Mining museum..... One great day's activity.

[róisín_dubh]

29. My sister lives there

I love Scranton. If I ever had to move back to the US, I’d go there.

[spooky3]

26. It's 13 degrees hotter than average on these dates.

It is dangerously hot, per NWS.

[MoseShrute]

3. Question

Did any state have an old government issued file cabinet with an Epstein label affixed?

[Vinca]

4. There was a two-dimensional cutout of a grand champion goat???? Darn, I should have gone.

[mopinko]

8. it aint a state fair w/o a butter cow.

tho they prolly wouldnt have the sense to put it in a glass fridge, like folks do.
i wonder how many states do that? i know il and wis do.

[Cadfael]

19. Heck, it's not a COUNTY fair

without a butter cow in Wisconsin or Illinois

[mopinko]

21. tru dat.

cardboard live stock. what next?

[Cadfael]

22. The single saving grace

Is that at least the poor goats aren’t suffering in that heat. I wouldn’t trust them to provide cooling fans and water to the poor things.

[yardwork]

5. It sounds like the state booths mostly feature companies.

It sounds like the vendors room at a conference.

Sounds like corporations paid Trump so they could feature their products. No celebration of anything. What a joke.

[Maine Abu El Banat]

6. You do get the chance

To see Pervert Hoover pass out from the heat!

[Six117]

10. Climate Change

.... And it does not matter that they choose not to believe in it.

[swimboy]

11. Definitely in the "most unforgettable" category

Give credit—he was right about that.

[Rebl2]

12. Sounds

Like a total bust. Poorly planned. Glad several states didn’t attend and waste taxpayer money on it.

[Javaman]

13. like everything the orange pedo does; slap dash and cheap.

and I bet you the state booths and their contents, were cooked up by his room full of dopes a the last minute with no input at all from the states shown.

once again, this all reeks of a money laundering grift.

[the_liberal_grandpa]

14. Another Failure. Just like his little tank parade.

[BobTheSubgenius]

15. Going to this giant fustercluck is like remarriage.

"The triumph of optimism over experience."

What is wrong with people? Some had actual expectations of grandeur, or even competence, in anything to do with the Apricot Imbecile?

[ultralite001]

16. David Foster Wallace's epic recounting of a day at the Illinois State Fair...

From the July 1994 edition of Harper's Magazine...

"Ticket to the Fair"





https://web.archive.org/web/20210328204403/https://harpers.org/wp-content/uploads/HarpersMagazine-1994-07-0001729.pdf

[wolfie001]

17. Ha ha fat orange imbecile cult members!

So glad they're unhappy. That's why they follow the orange fatty in the first place.

[Karasu]

18. The fuck were they expecting? Disney World? It's fucking Trump, the king of cheap-asses.

[Skittles]

20. THANK YOU

and it all serves as a metaphor for what Trump is doing to America, sucking the country dry

[spooky3]

27. It's a Fyre Festival on the Potomac. Nt

[walkingman]

28. Funny, I can't imagine in my wildest dreams anyone wanting to go to this. I bet there are some

real weiners there. ☮