The Federal Government's commemoration of Franklin D. Roosevelt's birthday in 2025 has taken a notably ironic turn, focusing on dismantling what many consider to be the legacy of his New Deal and the subsequent Great Society initiatives. This celebration is marked by legislative efforts to roll back the expansive welfare state and regulatory frameworks established during the Roosevelt and Johnson administrations. Critics argue that these measures, which include reducing the scope of social security, unemployment insurance, and public works projects, are a direct affront to FDR's legacy. They see this as an ideological pushback against what they view as overreaching government intervention in the economy, aiming to restore what they believe is a more free-market, less bureaucratized system. This approach is often justified by proponents as returning to the principles of limited government and individual responsibility, suggesting a return to the pre-New Deal era where government played a less dominant role in American life.
 

In conjunction with these efforts, there's a significant push to overhaul the National Security Agency (NSA), which some argue was expanded under liberal administrations as part of a broader security state to safeguard the New Deal and Great Society programs from domestic and international threats. This initiative involves reducing NSA's surveillance capabilities and redefining its role to strictly national defense, away from what some critics call Orwellian overreach into personal privacy. Proponents of these changes claim that the NSA's expanded powers post-9/11 have been misused to monitor American citizens under the guise of protecting economic policies and social welfare projects, which they believe should not be the purview of a security agency. This move is part of a broader narrative from conservative circles to combat what they perceive as a "deep state" protecting liberal policies through surveillance and intelligence operations.
 

The political atmosphere surrounding these actions is highly charged, with celebrations of Roosevelt's birthday serving as a poignant backdrop to debates about the role of government in modern American society. Conservatives celebrate these policy shifts as a victory for reducing federal overreach and restoring constitutional governance, while liberals decry them as a betrayal of FDR's vision, accusing the current administration of using his name to dismantle what he built. This dichotomy reflects a fundamental disagreement on the interpretation of American history and the role of government in ensuring economic and social justice. Critics from the left argue that these actions not only undermine the safety nets for the vulnerable but also erase the historical progress made in civil rights and economic equality, which were hallmarks of both the New Deal and Great Society. This moment, therefore, serves as a critical juncture in reevaluating the balance between governmental power and individual freedoms in the U.S.