At the end of July, it looked as if the saga of Trump’s repeated claims of vandalism at the reflecting pool had finally come to an end, as even Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney and his lackey, admitted that the government’s own evidence showed that the peeling paint was caused not by vandalism but by the shoddy quality of the work by a contractor who was picked without any competitive bidding. But the president, it appears, is not tired of embarrassing himself yet.
CBS News reports:
White House officials have asked the Justice Department to weigh whether it is possible to bring a new criminal case against David Hearn, the former Olympian who was accused of vandalizing the Lincoln Memorial’s Reflecting Pool, after federal prosecutors moved to dismiss the indictment against him earlier this month, according to multiple sources familiar with the discussions. Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia, had charged Hearn with felony destruction of government property, accusing him of causing more than $1,000 in damage to the sealant that was recently installed at the bottom of the Reflecting Pool.
Earlier this month, however, federal prosecutors moved to dismiss the indictment without prejudice, meaning the case could be brought again, citing new information that the damage was caused by a “botched installation” by a contractor, not vandalism. President Trump criticized the decision, writing on Truth Social that there “may have been some contractor difficulty, but the major damage was caused by VANDALS!” “I disagree 100% with Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, on the Reflecting Pool,” Mr. Trump wrote. “I don’t know what she was thinking?”
Perhaps the only thing in DC more tattered than the poorly installed pool lining is the president’s ego when he can’t get his insane conspiracy theories validated in court.
The Executive Watch is a project of the Institute for the Study of Modern Authoritarianism, and its flagship publication The UnPopulist, to track in an ongoing way the abuses of the power of the American presidency. It sorts these abuses into five categories: Personal Grift, Political Corruption, Presidential Retribution, Power Consolidation, and Policy Illegality. Click the category of interest to get an overview of all the abuses under it.
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