As she tells it, Melissa Farris was fed up by the time she purchased dish soap and spray paint and used them to vandalize the World War II Memorial on the National Mall earlier this month.
She said that after years of trying to draw attention to what she believes was the withholding of health care funds by her former employer in Kentucky, she was desperate.
“Veterans fought for people, not monuments or memorials, and I honor veterans by trying to keep our liberties and life and happiness here,” Farris told The Washington Post in her first interview since the incident. “One thing everybody can agree on is everybody loves to hate on something. So I made a big mess to get the nation’s attention.”
Many people come to Washington from around the United States and the world in hopes of influencing some sort of change. They stage protests on street corners. They meet with lawmakers and administration officials. Some have marched in costumes; others have destroyed property or harmed themselves.
“I believe now that I was extremely naive. I thought Washington is where you go to practice democracy,” said Farris, who lives in Ohio. “It broke my heart to walk into our nation’s capital. I think that I idealized it.”
Farris, who said that she has ADHD and autism and that she has seen a psychiatrist for anxiety, is facing two felony charges that carry maximum prison sentences of 10 years each. President Donald Trump, the Interior Department and various lawmakers condemned the incident. The 41-year-old said she and members of her family have received death threats since the vandalism.
Last week, a federal judge ordered Farris to return to Ohio pending her next hearing in early September.
Farris acknowledges vandalizing the memorial on Aug. 13. “I decided I was going to scream loudly enough that a nation will hear me,” she said.
Video she live-streamed on social media shows her dumping soap into the fountain beneath the Atlantic Arch. She can then be seen spray-painting the granite. Photos taken later of the scene show “Clean hands dirty $” spelled out in red beneath the arch and the surrounding stonework splattered with red and green paint.
“This is democracy sometimes, guys,” she says in the video. “And I didn’t have to shoot somebody. I didn’t have to go to war. I didn’t have to make choices that harmed another human being.”
The next day, the Justice Department filed two felony charges against Farris: depredation against U.S. property and destruction of veterans’ memorials.
“Defacing the World War II Memorial is a disgusting act and an insult to the Americans who fought and died for our country,” U.S. Attorney for D.C. Jeanine Pirro said in a statement announcing the charges. “We will not tolerate this kind of criminal activism, and we will ensure that anyone who desecrates a veterans’ memorial is held fully accountable.”
Trump condemned the vandalism of the memorial the day after it occurred.
“THERE CAN BE NO GREATER INSULT TO THOSE AMERICAN HEROES WHO DIED IN WORLD WAR II,” he wrote in a Truth Social post. “First the Reflecting Pool, now this. We are on their trail! Where do these animals come from???”
When reached for comment, White House spokeswoman Taylor Rogers said the memorial “honors the courageous servicemembers who served in World War II and the more than 400,000 Americans who paid the ultimate sacrifice.”
“The vandalism of the World War II Memorial was a shameful insult to these American heroes and will not be tolerated,” she added.
Farris said her sister told her that she had gotten the president’s attention.
“My sister told me and said, ‘It’s big, it’s bad, it’s national.’ And I said, ‘That’s fine.’ I can unite a nation quicker than anybody else, apparently, because it didn’t matter what political party they were. They can still all hate me, and then I’m going to give them the truth,” Farris said.
Farris said that for years, she worked as a stagehand for festivals and concerts in Ohio and Kentucky.
In 2023, Farris said, she moved to Kentucky after the Local 17 union branch of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees offered her a job on a dual union contract with the Local 369 branch of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.
The job was working to construct an electric vehicle battery factory in Glendale, Farris said. At the time, the BlueOval SK site was a joint venture between Ford Motor Co. and the South Korean company SK On.
Farris said her paycheck allocated funds for health and welfare. A July 2024 deposit notice from contractor United Electric Co. to Farris, which The Post reviewed, shows nearly $6,000 paid year-to-date for health and welfare. But Farris said she never received that money and was told it went to a pool, which she was not able to access.
“I was robbed, and so were my friends,” she said. “I’m just trying to do the right thing.”
The two union branches did not respond to requests for comment.
Three people who worked with Farris at the factory said they faced similar issues with their health and welfare allocation. They spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation over their connection to Farris.
After voicing concern to superiors, Farris said, she was laid off in August 2024. She said management cited cutbacks on labor, but she believes it was retaliation for speaking out. A Ford spokesperson said Farris was not employed by the company. The contractor that employed her, United Electric Co., did not respond to a request for comment.
Eventually, Farris said, she left Kentucky and returned to Ohio, where she tried to continue sounding an alarm about what she worried was theft from union workers. She said she made signs and staged protests on busy roads.
After several months, Farris said, she decided to go to Washington and arrived on July 21. For weeks, she said, she camped around the city. “I’m a campfire girl,” she said. A few days before the vandalism, U.S. Park Police cited her for camping on federal property, according to court records.
In the weeks before the memorial was vandalized, Farris emailed journalists. Once in Washington, she also reached out to whistleblower groups, but they said they couldn’t help, Farris said.
Eugene Jeen-Young Kim Ohm, the public defender representing Farris, declined to comment until he could consult with his client. Farris said she wants her case to go to trial so she can talk about the union’s alleged wrongdoing in a courtroom.
“Given the gravity of the situation, I understand what’s before me,” she said. “I am willing to lose my freedom if that means Americans can wake up and realize theirs has been taken, too.”
Since the vandalism occurred, Farris has received dozens of angry messages from people on social media. “I hope you rot in hell you anti-American piece of s*** bottom feeding low life,” one person wrote, according to messages reviewed by The Post. “You deserve to die,” another wrote.
Farris said that despite the criticism, she sees herself as a patriot.
“Blue collar built America,” she said. “We maintain America. We pay for the maintaining of America, and we don’t get to touch any of it. We’re stuck in tiny perimeters pulling up our bootstraps every day, and no matter how hard we pull, it’s never enough.”
The post Woman accused of WWII Memorial vandalism says she wanted ‘nation’s attention’ appeared first on Washington Post.
