Trump’s Reflecting Pool renovations have cost taxpayers millions — and didn’t work
After bragging that his repairs couldn't be tampered with, Trump blames “vandals” that no one can seem to find.
How insane has all this Reflecting Pool nonsense gotten? Quite insane. At press time, the pool remained fenced off — either for the July 4 holiday or at Trump’s direction, depending on who you believe — and taxpayers will now be on the hook to repair… Trump’s repairs. Ava has a rundown of this entire debacle below. To support the independent, adversarial journalism of American Doom, consider a paid subscription or dropping a few bucks in our Coffee Fund. Now, on to the news…
President Donald Trump’s $16.4 million, tax-funded Reflecting Pool renovations are falling apart. Now, he’ll spend even more money to fix the renovations that taxpayers have already paid for.
After only a few weeks, algae blooms and peeling paint have plagued the newly-renovated pool. Trump says vandals are to blame, although the evidence of those claims is scant. The pool is now fenced off from the public, monitored by cameras put in place by the Trump administration, and patrolled by members of the National Guard and police department from across the country who have been granted special jurisdiction in Washington D.C. in advance of Independence Day celebrations.
While Trump said the project would only cost about $2 million and would be completed in a week, the costs rose to $16.4 million — all of which has been paid with taxpayer dollars. Now, as his renovations are failing, Trump has ordered the National Park Service (NPS) to fence off the pool, and is planning to drain it once more after July 4 in order to fix the peeling paint job and mitigate algae blooms.
In early June, Trump completed his renovations of the pool, one of many construction projects in and around Washington that the president has taken up in his second term, costing taxpayers at least $1.2 trillion combined. By June 5th, the pool had been refilled with water, but mere days afterwards, the water had turned bright green and the new “American Flag Blue” paint was peeling off the surface it was just painted onto.
The NPS also said in a federal court filing, which was part of a lawsuit filed to stop Trump’s work on the landmark, that there were cuts in the caulking of the pool, prompting Trump to blame vandals for the peeling paint and algae blooms.
Steve Goodale, an experienced builder of swimming pools and aquatic systems, and Rosalina Stancheva Chrisova, professor of aquatic ecology at George Mason University, told NPR that the large, stagnant pool provides perfect conditions for algae blooms, especially because the pool is exposed to sunlight with no shade. Both also said that the renovations created disturbances that likely could have accelerated the growth of algae.
As for the alleged cuts in the pool, Trump says vandals are to blame. In a recent post on Truth Social, Trump claimed that unnamed vandals had cut a “350 foot gash, made by a very sharp knife or razors” and that “somebody had to work very hard, probably in the dark of night, to create such a condition.”
Trump had previously said his renovations were so solid that even someone with a knife wouldn’t be able to damage the Reflecting Pool.
“This will last for at least 50 years,” Trump said in May. “If you had a knife — I don’t want to give anybody any ideas — If you had a knife you can’t even cut it.”
Trump also claimed that six people have been arrested for the damage done to the “now beautiful” reflecting pool, but only one of those allegedly arrested has been identified, 67-year-old David Hearn. On June 19, Hearn was biking near the Reflecting Pool when he noticed a part of the liner peeling, he told the Washington Post. Hearn then reached into the water and grabbed the peeling piece of liner, but claims he did not take it out of the pool. As he was preparing to leave, Hearn was arrested by the U.S. Park Police.
“I didn’t destroy or break or peel anything,” Hearn told the Post. “By the time I realized what was going on, I was being put in handcuffs.”
Hearn was arrested on a misdemeanor charge of destruction of government property and is scheduled to appear in court on July 9. U.S. Park Police and the NPS have not confirmed any information about the identities of the other individuals that Trump has claimed have been arrested for tampering with the pool.
Along with the complete lack of information about others who have been arrested for allegedly vandalizing the Reflecting Pool, the Trump administration has also failed to provide any solid evidence of acts of vandalism. He has said that the federal government will release photos to support his claims, but only one video has been released by NPS. The video appears to show a woman simply reaching her hand into the water.
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Trump has said he wants the Reflecting Pool open by July 4, when the president will take part in events across Washington that include a $1.6 million fireworks show, paid for with NPS funds, and culminating in the “most spectacular TRUMP RALLY of them all,” the president announced on June 15. The total cost of the fireworks display and rally aren’t known, but it’s the second time in as many months that Trump has used taxpayer dollars to hold events in Washington. In June, Trump spent $60 million taxpayer money on his UFC Freedom 250 event.
Now, Trump has spent an estimated $16.4 million on his Reflecting Pool project — $11 million more than Trump himself said the renovations would cost. Two companies with ties to Trump benefitted from those contracts, paid with taxpayer money.
Greenwater Solutions installed the new water purification system in the pool that has failed to prevent algae blooms. The company is owned by John Cafaro, who lives near Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate. Cafaro has donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to Trump over the years, including $250,000 in 2020 and $100,000 in 2024, both years Trump was campaigning for president. Atlantic Industrial Coatings installed the “American Flag Blue” sealant that is now failing.
Trump has claimed to have no relationship with Atlantic Industrial Coatings, despite having bragged in May that he told Interior Secretary Doug Burgum about a contractor who had performed pool repairs at Trump’s properties.
“I have a guy who’s unbelievable at doing swimming pools,” Trump recalled telling Burgum while speaking in the Oval Office. “So I asked him, I said, ‘I have an idea.’ I’m going to send my contractor over, take a look. He looked at it, he called me up and said, ‘Sir, we can do something on it.’”
The company’s winning of a no-bid contract after Trump boasted of his unnamed contractor has gotten the attention of Democrats in Congress. Prior to winning the contract to renovate the Reflecting Pool — at $11.3 million more than initially projected by Trump — Atlantic Industrial Coatings had never received a federal contract. Nor had the company ever worked on a project like the Reflecting Pool, according to Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), who wrote the company in May as part of the senator’s probe of the contract.
Blumenthal is among those calling for an investigation into the bidding process, noting that Atlantic Industrial Coatings submitted a bid that matched “current contract’s value down to the dollar and included a 20 percent profit margin.”
Blumenthal questioned if American tax dollars are being used in a responsible way by Trump, echoing concerns about many of Trump’s vanity construction projects. Trump plans to, once again, drain the Reflecting Pool after July 4 in an attempt to fix the renovation he just completed. The cost for this second round of repairs is not known.
In his letter, Blumenthal pointed out that the company received much more money than Trump’s initial estimate to renovate the Reflecting Pool.
“The ballooning payments to Atlantic Industrial and Atlantic Industrial’s lack of any obvious qualifications for the Reflecting Pool project raise troubling questions about whether excess taxpayer dollars are (yet again) being diverted to President Trump’s manifestly unqualified friends and associates,” Blumenthal said. “The American people deserve to know whether excess taxpayer dollars are being used — without the authorization of Congress — to reward the President’s preferred partners and desecrate national landmarks.”
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