President Donald Trump kicked off the event with a headlining speech Wednesday after musical acts dropped out of the lineup citing concerns over partisanship.

Trump's Great American State Fair on the National Mall opened with power outages and empty booths as many states skipped out on the event.

The event faced programming challenges weeks before it began Thursday and has since experienced a bumpy start to its 16-day run.

Another day of sparse crowds follows Trump’s claim that 45,000 attended his opening-night speech

President Donald Trump kicked off the event with a headlining speech Wednesday after musical acts dropped out of the lineup citing concerns over partisanship.