President Donald Trump said Sunday that the Fourth of July celebration on the National Mall was "an even more spectacular evening" than had been expected after a weather-related evacuation forced spectators to leave the area. 

"The Crowd at 7:05 in the evening was 422,000 people!" Trump wrote on Truth Social. "All were forced to leave because of the weather, the event was cancelled, and everyone was gone because of lightning. When I heard that it was cancelled, I immediately overturned that decision, and waited a while for people to come back."

The event, part of the "Salute to America" celebration, had been evacuated Saturday evening after a severe thunderstorm warning prompted officials to clear the National Mall. Trump said he reversed the decision to cancel the program and waited for the crowd to reassemble.

"Incredibly, at least 150,000 people returned, and it was an even more spectacular evening than it would have been as normalized!" he wrote. "It showed work under pressure."

Trump praised the agencies responsible for managing the crowd's return. "Congratulations to the Secret Service and Law Enforcement on being able to get so many people back into the Arena in such rapid fashion!" he wrote.

Trump ultimately took the stage and delivered a speech before a fireworks show that the White House billed as the largest in U.S. history, with organizers saying more than 850,000 shells were launched from roughly 10 sites around the Mall, including the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool and barges on the Potomac River.

In his post, Trump linked the timing of the storm to the display itself.

"It was an amazing evening made even more spectacular by the fact that, immediately after the Great Fireworks ended, the rains came down, full blast!" he wrote.

Saturday's event capped weeks of activities marking the country's semiquincentennial. Trump's speech touched on immigration enforcement, the military and his administration's policy agenda before the fireworks display began.