Jimmy Carter's 99th birthday celebration moved to avoid shutdown threat
ATLANTA - Former president Jimmy Carter is turning 99 this weekend, and despite a looming government shutdown, a big celebration at his library and museum is still happening.
Events originally scheduled for Sunday, Carter's birthday, will now be held Saturday on the Atlanta campus of the library and the adjacent Carter Center. An end-of-Saturday deadline looms for Congress to reach a new budget agreement to keep all government offices - including presidential libraries and museums - open.
The commemoration is scheduled from noon to 4 p.m. Saturday. It will include a 99-cent entry fee for the Carter Museum, which features a replica of the Oval Office as it appeared during Carter's 1977-81 White House term. Anyone 16 or younger will receive free admission. There will be birthday cake, games, crafts and food trucks on the grounds.
The museum's theater will show "All the President's Men" at 1 p.m. on Saturday. The movie chronicles President Richard Nixon's downfall from the Watergate scandal. That turn in U.S. political history, along with the fallout of the Vietnam War, set the stage for Carter, then a one-term Georgia governor, to mount a winning campaign for president as a Washington outsider who promised never to lie to his fellow Americans.
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Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter spotted
Festival goers in Plains were in for a surprise Saturday when former President Jimmy Carter and his wife First Lady Rosalynn Carter made an appearance at the annual Peanut Festival. The couple took a ride in their SUV, greeting everyone who stood along the parade route. This comes just a week before Carter's 99th birthday, and nearly seven months after it was announced he would seek home hospice care.
Carter is the longest-lived U.S. president. He has been in home hospice care at his Plains residence since February. His wife, Rosalynn, now 96, has dementia and is also at home with the former president.
If lawmakers in Washington reach a spending agreement by the deadline, the birthday observances will continue Sunday, including the 99-cent museum admission. The Sunday schedule is to also include a naturalization ceremony for 99 new American citizens.
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A partial government shutdown also would affect federally run historic sites in and around the south Georgia town of Plains, including Carter's boyhood home and farm. Plains residents celebrated the former president's approaching milestone last weekend as part of the annual Plains Peanut Festival. The former president and first lady made a surprise appearance in the festival parade, riding in a Secret Service vehicle.
How to wish President Carter a happy birthday
In less than two weeks, former President Jimmy Carter will celebrate a monumental birthday. On October 1, the country's oldest living president will turn 99 years old and The Carter Presidential Library and Museum invites you to join in on the celebration.
As part of the celebrations, the Carter Center is asking for people to send a picture or video of themselves wishing him a happy birthday on a special website for the event or by using the hashtag #JimmyCarter99. The images will be combined into a digital mosaic which will be displayed at Mercedes-Benz Stadium, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, and the Corey Tower.
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A closeup of President Jimmy Carter, addressing a town meeting in 1979. (Getty Images)
So far, the center says it already has 13,000 well-wishes from people across the globe.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.