Trump prepares to sign his agenda bill, with a flyover and fireworks to mark the occasion

The event marks the culmination of weeks of effort by the president and his team to get the bill across the finish line.

It’s the celebration President Donald Trump has been waiting for. After weeks of cajoling Republicans into backing his domestic mega-bill — despite lingering concerns about its Medicaid cuts, deficit expansion and political pitfalls — Trump will sign the measure into law on the White House South Lawn on Friday afternoon. He’s turned the traditional July 4 picnic into a celebration of the country’s independence and of his win in Congress, seizing upon the day’s fanfare to salute the most decisive legislative victory of his second term. The festivities will include a bomber jet flyover – a nod to the military’s recent strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities – and a fireworks show on the National Mall. It’s all how Trump envisioned it when he first set the July 4 deadline to get the bill approved weeks ago. Even some of his own allies thought the timeline was overly ambitious. But Trump’s iron grip on his own party, combined with what a White House official described as an “omnipresent” effort by the president to get Republicans on board, culminated in the bill’s passage in the House on Thursday with only two GOP defections in the chamber. In many ways, the event marks the payoff for weeks of effort by the president and his team to get the bill across the finish line. Trump invited members of Congress to come to the event, which will also be attended by military families who are the usual guests for the Independence Day picnic. In other ways, however, the moment is just the start of Trump’s efforts to sell his bill to an American public that, according to polls, remains skeptical of its contents.