During a Monday afternoon event at the base of the Lincoln Memorial, President Donald Trump said that the second round of renovations on the Reflecting Pool — necessary after the liner began to flake off earlier this year — was “a complete job and we’re very proud of it.”
“We fixed the leaks, we resurfaced the bottom in a beautiful dark blue,” the president said, adding that it had been finished in “the strongest coating you can get.”
But when two Washington Post reporters walked the full perimeter of the newly reopened Reflecting Pool immediately after the speech, they observed several spots where the coating appeared to be cracked or beginning to peel.
There were at least 20 other areas where the coating’s color was distinctly uneven, with areas streaked with light blue instead of the “American flag blue” that the president mentioned in his speech.
“The Reflecting Pool has never look this beautiful and it’s all thanks to President Donald J. Trump,” said an Interior spokesperson via an unsigned email. “He’s an expert builder who was able to repair the pool in ways Obama and Biden could never even dream of.”
The spokesperson attributed the light-blue discoloration to “surplus coating” and said the “lighter blue color will fade away or be lightly scrubbed off to show the beautiful American Flag Blue coating underneath.”
Shown photos of the areas that appeared to be cracking, the spokesperson said they were “stray pieces … left over from the renovation and needed repairs due to deranged vandalism. Those pieces will be picked up. Thanks to President Trump, the pool is clear, clean, leak-proof, and reflects the iconic scenery that surrounds this magical place. ”
The cause of the recent flaws was not immediately clear. The National Park Service was aware early last week of uneven coloring in areas that had been repaired for a second time, two people with knowledge of the situation, who did not have permission to speak publicly, told The Post after the president spoke.
In June, after the first round of renovations in the spring, flaking appeared quickly after the pool was refilled. An inspection report obtained by the Post investigation found that the pool’s lining deteriorated in at least 85 places due to errors in the renovation including improper materials and a rush to complete the job. The materials used to line the pool have specific requirements for application technique and drying time, and failure to apply them correctly can result in adhesion problems, coatings experts have told The Post.
The administration initially blamed the pool’s problems on vandals, and several people, including former Olympian David Hearn, were arrested and charged for touching the pool and its lining over the summer.
The Justice Department dropped the case in July, saying that the installation had been “botched.” Last month, a judge said federal prosecutors cannot refile charges against Hearn.
The pool was drained, repaired, refilled and reopened again in October.
The discolored splotches dot the southwestern edge of the pool, near the Lincoln Memorial, where sections of the perimeter expansion joint were recently repaired and replaced.
Contractors specified a flexible material called 11-35 to coat the joints, according to an Aug. 14 repair plan reviewed by The Post, replacing the thicker, dark-blue coating that previously buckled in two dozen locations. Both materials are produced by San Diego-based Rhino Linings, which specified how their lining should be applied to the joints, according to the inspection report reviewed by The Post.
Rhino Linings did not immediately reply to The Post’s request for comment.
Elsewhere, bumps and repair patches now dot the lining. Reporters on Monday saw at least 10 areas where the liner appeared to be detaching or separating, as well as an apparent narrow opening in the lining revealing the red tape used on the expansion joint.
During his speech Monday, Trump again blamed vandals for the pool’s troubles, saying that the “vandalism was unprecedented.”
“The whole thing is in great shape and we’re going to make sure nobody vandalizes it,” said Trump. “And I’m going to ask the Park Police and the people to really watch, because a lot of people are sort of watching as this group of people slashed the hell out of it.”
It was unclear what incident he was describing. According to federal records, the administration is spending at least $343,100 on video cameras to monitor several of Trump’s construction projects.
Among the president’s detractors, the Reflecting Pool has become a metaphor for what the president’s interventions represent: a chasm for money and attention. In Washington, it has become a bit of a punch line, and homemadeHalloweencostumes of the algae-filled, flakingpool went viral throughout the weekend. One was featured on “The View.”
The president criticized his predecessors’ efforts to revamp the Reflecting Pool, falsely inflating the price of a 2012 renovation. “President Obama and President Biden together spent over $144 million trying to figure it out and fix it. … And it was closed almost during the entire time. They were unable to get it working,” Trump claimed.
Under Obama, the pool underwent a $34 million renovation. The Biden administration did not conduct any significant work on the pool.
“They’ve had years here where you couldn’t see any water,” said Trump. “It was just algae and it had a bad aroma, to put it mildly.”
Throughout the speech, Trump held up visuals that he said showed the previous state of the Reflecting Pool, which he said was now “better and more beautiful than it’s ever been before.” He spoke more enthusiastically about the materials and techniques used on the pool than he did about the looming midterm elections.
At the end of the speech, he turned to face the crowd and held one of the visuals — but the one of the algae-filled pool, not the clean, renovated version. After answering a shouted question from a reporter about Iran, Trump placed it on the floor and departed in his motorcade, which slowly traversed the length of the pool.
The Reflecting Pool, he had said earlier, “is a work of art in many ways, but it was a work of art that never worked. But now it will work.”
Jake Spring, Dan Diamond and Cat Zakrzewski contributed to this report.
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