The most misguided and wasteful paint job in American history

 the most misguided and wasteful paint job in American history

• Public Citizen 

  citizen.org

  From:president@citizen.org

  
  

  To:m.mk@..

  Fri, May 15 2026 at 2:18 PM

  At the behest of Donald Trump, the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool in Washington, D.C., is being painted bright blue.
  
  A few notes:
  

  • The long, shallow basin sits on the National Mall between the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial.

  • It is not for swimming or other recreational activities.

  • Its name comes from the fact that it was designed specifically to reflect those memorials and invoke the best ideals of the men they honor.

  • Now it will just give the impression that we live under a perpetually clear, blue sky.

  • It’s a wonder Trump isn’t having the Reflecting Pool painted with a giant mural of himself giving Abraham Lincoln the finger.

  Public Citizen has launched an investigation into Trump’s Reflecting Pool fiasco — which may be the most misguided and wasteful paint job in American history — demanding records under the Freedom of Information Act.
  
  Here’s what we know so far:
  
  The regime awarded the contract to, in Trump’s own words, “a guy who’s unbelievable at doing swimming pools.” The company had never worked with the federal government before but had supposedly painted swimming pools at one of Trump’s golf resorts.
  
  The law normally requires contracts for major work like this to go through a competitive process. Trump bypassed that requirement by claiming that his administration would suffer “serious injury” if it followed the law — without so much as one word explaining how that could possibly be true.
  
  Trump initially bragged that the project would cost $1.8 million. But the contract has ballooned to over $13 million.
  
  Public Citizen has filed dozens of Freedom of Information Act requests since Trump returned to power. In April, we succeeded in a lawsuit after the administration ignored our Freedom of Information Act request for the contract related to the gaudy, gargantuan ballroom Trump is erecting where the East Wing of the White House stood until he illegally demolished it last fall.
  
  If the Trump administration ignores our Freedom of Information Act request about the repainting of the Reflecting Pool, we will take it to court.
  
  
  
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  For progress,
  
  - Lisa Gilbert & Robert Weissman, Co-Presidents of Public Citizen