Arwa Mahdawi: DC's 'renovated' pool reflects the Trump administration's dangerous hubris
Source: The Guardian
DC’s ‘renovated’ pool reflects the Trump administration’s dangerous hubris
When asked what his takeaways from the Iran war were, Trump said he believed there were no limits to his power
Arwa Mahdawi
Sat 20 Jun 2026 13.00 BST
Last modified on Sat 20 Jun 2026 13.01 BST
Trump has spent millions creating a giant swamp in DC
It’s been a busy week for the US’s birthday boy. First, there was the cage fight on the White House lawn, in honour of the United States’ 250th anniversary and Donald Trump’s 80th. Then, after watching sweaty men fight, the president flew to France to try to sort out the mess he’d helped create in the Middle East. I regret to inform you that despite Trump signing what Jimmy Kimmel called “the retreaty of Versailles”, it does not really look like the Iran war has been sorted out. Still, the president seems happy with himself. After Axios asked what his takeaways from the Iran war were, Trump said he believes there are “no limits” to his power.
The Lincoln Memorial reflecting pool would beg to differ. In between the cage fights and a catastrophic war, Trump has been waging a very expensive battle with the algae in the famous monument, which was the scene of Martin Luther King’s “I Have a Dream” speech. The president has spent $14.2m trying to make the “filthy” and “dirty” pool into the resort-like water feature of his own dreams. Alas, he has proved quite powerless against the algae blooms.
To be fair to Trump, algae is an aggressive adversary. Ever since the Washington landmark was built in 1922, the 2,000ft reflecting pool has been plagued with leaks and algae blooms that turn the water green. There have been various attempts to fix these issues, including a $34m renovation of the monument in 2012, during the Obama administration, but the problems keep coming back. Enter Trump, a walking case study in the Dunning-Kruger effect, who vowed to fix the problem once and for all. During an event in April, Trump explained that he’d “probably built more than 100 swimming pools” and had “a guy who’s unbelievable at doing swimming pools”. The reflecting pool is not actually a swimming pool but forget about that little detail. According to Trump, he’d do what no other president had been capable of doing and clean up the whole thing in “two weeks”. He reiterated this “two week” timeline at events on 7 May and 11 May.
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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/jun/20/trump-renovated-pool-hubris