Donald Trump used a government exemption to give a $6.9 million no-bid contract to his “pool guy” to repaint the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool to an ocean-blue color after complaining it “never looked great.”
The exemption is typically reserved for urgent situations to prevent “serious injury, financial or other, to the government”, according to documents reviewed in an exclusive report by The New York Times.
But Trump used the exemption to get the company, Atlantic Industrial Coatings, to quickly begin work on the memorial as part of an array of building projects and refurbishments taking place across Washington D.C. ahead of America’s 250th birthday this year.
How does painting a pond that size cost 7 million?
Properly emptying and refilling it would probably cost a good amount.
Labor isn’t cheap, and government contracts (hopefully) use prevailing wage, which is pretty high.
A proper contractor would clean it first, and then add several coats of a what is probably supposed to be a special type of paint. That’s pretty expensive.
In this case however, it’s a grift, so it won’t actually cost them nearly that much because that’s the point.
It’s a grift.
Apparently theres more to the type of blue, they used, too.
Is there a more apt metaphor for the Trump administration than this?
In a time of unparalleled uncertainty, war in the Middle East, rising energy prices and inflation, pedophile billionaires in the highest positions of government, rising unemployment and a backsliding of minority rights.
What is the Trump administration spending our tax dollars on to help Americans?
Painting the fucking reflection pool blue.
He is painting it to remove the ability to reflect. Absolutely no more apt a metaphor.
Surprised he didn’t paint it orange with gold accents.
Narcissus Orange
I don’t know about everyone else but definitely know having a national monument painted that tacky default pool bottom blue really helps me sleep better at night.
Who needs to do any reflecting in this day and age anyway?
What, you don’t like a giant wading pool?
Not his fault system is designed the way it allows such things
Right. Only his fault that he is doing such things.
We should not rely on good hearts of politicians
You paint Bernie and AoC with the Trump brush?
I dont paint shit, stop talking nonsense. I don’t trust you to make a right choice
True.
Non-sequitor, but true.
“As a developer, I’ve probably built more than 100 swimming pools, different buildings. I built, and I have some really good pool builders … but over the years, I’ve had three or four really good ones,” he said.
Trump went on about how a “friend” from Germany had similarly knocked the landmark’s condition as “filthy, disgusting,”
I mean, it’s not a swimming pool. Like, it doesn’t need to be free of algae and it’s not full of disinfecting chlorine.
Like, you wouldn’t point at a lake and say “eww, gross, it’s full of living things and dirt”.
EDIT: Okay, upon further reading, maybe he does think that it’s intended for swimming or wants it to be used for that.
https://www.tennessean.com/story/news/politics/2026/05/04/donald-trump-reflecting-pool/89926382007/
President Donald Trump posted an apparently artificially generated image of himself with members of his Cabinet swimming in the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.
Late on May 1, Trump posted a fake image of himself, shirtless, giving a thumbs up as he lounges in the pool with other Cabinet members in their swimsuits.
Also, as if “more than 100” swimming pools is supposed to be a lot when you’re talking about a project of this scale and purported significance.
It does need to be algae free, and to that end the water is pumped with ozone rather than chlorine. The last rebuild, during Obama, needed a full draining soon after recommissining to clear out the algae again, at some cost. They since ramped up the ozone levels to kill anything in the pool.
Of course he does. He’s that stupid.
wouldn’t be called a ‘pool’ if it wasn’t fer swimming. /s
You know for a fact, somebody is going to shit in it.
Trumps hoping people piss in it so he can go for a splash.
Pool Guy probably thinks he’s going to get paid.
Not trump’s money so he might. That’s our money as taxpayers.
100% chance he took this as an opportunity to actually get the money Trump hasn’t paid him previously. And I can’t really fault him much for that honestly.
Someone was going to get paid for this stupid shit, might as well be someone who’s been fucked over in the past to try and make them whole.
He drove the goddamn presidential motorcade through the reflecting pool
I fully believe he thinks its a swimming pool.
He’s posted AI pictures of him and the cabinet swimming in it.
Yeah I saw that, how tiny are their legs?
Not tiny at all! Didn’t you know Trump is 6’23"?
I thought it was a joke. I read the article, this fucker is giving a pool service company the job. This is genius or sheer ludicrosity. I made that word up.
How could this possibly be considered genius?
It’s about the kickback… Why are you surprised?
It’s to clean out all the dead kids
someone has an opportunity to do something really funny
