By ROBERT BURNS, LOLITA C. BALDOR and DARLENE SUPERVILLE

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is marshalling tanks, bombers and other machinery of war for a Fourth of July celebration that traditionally is light on military might, while critics accused him of using America’s military as a political prop.

Under White House direction, the Pentagon was scrambling to arrange for an Air Force B-2 stealth bomber and other warplanes to conduct flyovers of the celebration on the National Mall. There will be Navy F-35 and F-18 fighter jets, the Navy Blue Angels aerial acrobatics team, Army and Coast Guard helicopters and Marine V-22 Ospreys.

Two Bradley fighting vehicles were in place Wednesday near the Lincoln Memorial, where Trump will deliver a speech on for the Independence Day celebration.

A small number of 60-ton Army Abrams battle tanks were sent to Washington by rail to be positioned on or near the National Mall, though the District of Columbia government fired back with its own verbal salvo.

“Tanks, but no tanks,” it tweeted, adding that the Pentagon itself said last year that a tank’s steel tracks could damage city roadways. Also scheduled to make appearances over the Mall are the presidential Air Force One and Marine One aircraft.

Trump, casting the extravaganza as a “Salute to America,” tweeted on Tuesday that military leaders are “thrilled” to participate. If so, they were hiding it well. Pentagon officials referred questions to the White House. Military officials would not even say on the record whether Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, plans to attend.

“This is raw politicization,” countered Loren Dejonge Schulman, a senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security and a Pentagon and White House official during the Obama administration. She said in an email exchange that Trump’s use of the military appears to be less about honoring the men and women serving in uniform than about trying to “brag to and humor” his political cronies.

Rep. Betty McCollum complained, “Mr. Trump is hijacking the celebration and twisting it into a taxpayer-funded, partisan political rally that’s more about promoting a Trumpian cult of personality than the spirit of American independence and freedom. The Minnesota Democrat, who chairs the Interior Appropriations subcommittee, said the Interior Department and the Pentagon have not answered multiple requests for details on how much the event will cost.

The administration undercut its own assertion of it being a nonpolitical event, however, when senior presidential adviser Kellyanne Conway said the speech will highlight “the success of this administration in opening up so many jobs for individuals, what we’ve done for veterans,” in addition to celebrating democracy, patriotism and the military.

A fundamental feature of the military’s role in American democracy is its insulation from politics, which is meant to ensure the armed forces’ loyalty to the Constitution rather than to an individual elected leader. That is why, for example, members of the military are not allowed to participate in political campaigns, and why Trump’s first defense secretary, Jim Mattis, slow-rolled a White House plan for a Veterans Day military parade last year.

Muscular military displays of the kind that are common in authoritarian countries like China and North Korea are not quintessentially American, although military bands and honor guards customarily participate in holiday parades and warplanes sometimes are used in flyovers at big sporting events. The U.S. traditionally has not embraced showy exhibitions of raw military power as a claim of international prestige and influence.

Trump had wanted a military parade of tanks and other equipment in Washington after he watched a military parade on Bastille Day in Paris in 2017. His plan eventually was scuttled, partly because of cost, though he apparently held on to the idea. Local officials objected at that time, too.

A ticket-only area in front of the Lincoln Memorial is being set aside for VIPs, including members of Trump’s family, friends and members of the military, the White House said.

The Republican National Committee is distributing a “small number” of tickets to the event, which it says is standard practice and follows what the Democratic National Committee did under Democratic presidents. However, those were smaller events at the White House, for example, and not major productions taking over the National Mall.

David Lapan, a retired Marine colonel and former senior spokesman at the Pentagon and the Department of Homeland Security, said enlisting troops for a Fourth of July event in the nation’s capital only adds to their stress.

“After 18-plus years of war, we have asked a lot of our military and their families, and they have sacrificed,” Lapan said. “Let’s give them a day off rather than a day on for this holiday.”

Some Democrats in Congress objected to what they saw as Trump’s political motives.

“Most shameful of all is the fact that our military is being co-opted for a gratuitous display of strength by a commander in chief who relishes the attention of dictators and despots,” she said.

The Pentagon said it had made no overall estimate of the cost of the military’s participation. The Air Force said it costs $122,311 an hour to fly the B-2 bomber, which is making the trip from its home at Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri and back. Officials said this will be considered a training event, the cost of which is already budgeted. They said the per-hour flying cost of the F-22 fighter is $65,128.

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Associated Press writers Matthew Daly, Deb Riechmann and Ellen Knickmeyer contributed to this report.

MENLO PARK, Calif. (AP) — A Facebook mail facility near company headquarters was evacuated Monday after a routine check found mail possibly containing the nerve agent sarin.

Authorities put the site under quarantine as they conducted additional testing. Four buildings were evacuated and three have been cleared for people to come back in, said Facebook spokesman Anthony Harrison in a statement. The suspicious package was delivered around 11 a.m. to one of the company’s mail rooms, he said.

“Authorities have not yet identified the substance found,” Harrison wrote.

There were no reports of injuries, Menlo Park Fire Marshal Jon Johnston said. Incoming mail undergoing routine processing by machine tested positive for sarin, but it could have been a false positive, Johnston said.

“Right now we don’t have anybody that has any symptoms,” he said. “We’re just doing verification.”

The FBI is assisting in the investigation, as is common in incidents such as this one.

The federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says sarin is a chemical warfare agent that is a clear, colorless, odorless and tasteless liquid. It can evaporate into the environment, prompting symptoms within seconds.

A drop of sarin on skin can cause sweating and muscle twitching, and exposure to large doses can result in paralysis and respiratory failure leading to death.

The CDC says people who are mildly exposed usually recover completely.

By GRANT SCHULTE

LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) — Nebraska voters may decide next year whether to legalize casino gambling in a ballot measure that could tip the number of states that allow commercial gambling into the majority.

Supporters of legalized casinos have launched a petition drive to place the issue on the 2020 ballot with financial backing from the economic development corporation owned by the Winnebago Tribe of Nebraska.

Twenty-five states — including neighboring Colorado, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, and South Dakota — allow commercial casino gambling with games such as slot machines, craps and roulette wheels, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Iowa casinos near Omaha, in particular, cater to Nebraska residents looking to gamble.

“Hundreds of millions of dollars go across the border every year,” said Lance Morgan, the CEO of Ho-Chunk Inc., the corporation pushing the measure on the tribe’s behalf. “For a Nebraskan to do gaming, you have to go half a mile. It’s the height of paternalism to try to try to restrict it.”

Morgan said he’s confident, based on the group’s internal polling, that voters will approve the measure if it appears on the ballot.

Only two states, Hawaii and Utah, have a complete ban on gambling. Nebraska is among states that allow Native American tribal casinos that are limited to bingo and card games where the house has no stake in the outcome, such as poker. Nebraska also offers keno, horse racing and a lottery. Commercial casinos, by contrast, have slot machines, craps, roulette wheels and card games such as blackjack.

The measure is certain to face opposition from leading conservatives, including Republican Gov. Pete Ricketts and former University of Nebraska football coach and athletic director Tom Osborne.

“Casinos are bad for families and bad for business,” said Nate Grasz, policy director for the Nebraska Family Alliance, a conservative policy group that plans to fight the measure. “All men and women deserve an opportunity to build the best lives for themselves, and state-sanctioned gambling robs them of that opportunity.”

Gambling opponents successfully defeated ballot measures in 2004 and 2006, despite being outspent by wealthy casino interests. In 2014, they challenged a gambling measure in court and persuaded the Nebraska Supreme Court to declare it unconstitutional, striking it from the ballot.

But some gambling opponents acknowledge public support has grown in recent years.

“It’s going to be hard,” said Pat Loontjer, executive director of Gambling with the Good Life. “We’ve been doing this for 24 years, and, well, the atmosphere in the state has changed.”

Supporters said they’ve changed the ballot measure to withstand a court challenge. The latest campaign will require three petitions — a constitutional amendment to allow casino gambling at state-licensed horse racing tracks and two state law changes to regulate and tax the industry. The state Supreme Court rejected a previous measure because it merged those issues onto one ballot, forcing voters to give one yes-or-no answer to multiple questions.

“We’ve learned from our mistakes in the past,” said Bob Moser, president of the Nebraska Horsemen’s Benevolent and Protective Association. “We have a really good plan and great partners, and we’re very optimistic about our chances this time.”

Moser said allowing casinos at state-licensed horse racing tracks would increase purse sizes and make horse races larger and more competitive, and thus revive the struggling industry.

A similar effort failed to gain enough signatures in 2016, but independent observers blame poor management, not a lack of support. The company that managed that petition drive claimed to have collected more than enough signatures, but nearly 42,000 were later declared invalid. The company now faces a lawsuit over the petition drive.

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Follow Grant Schulte at https://twitter.com/GrantSchulte