The Trump administration says excavation will begin within the next two weeks for President Trump’s proposed 250-foot-tall triumphal arch near Memorial Bridge, between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington National Cemetery. Renderings show a massive structure covered in gold details, topped by a winged, torch-bearing figure. Interior Secretary Doug Burgum predicts it will become one of America’s great architectural landmarks.
“This will be one of the Great Pieces of American Architecture,” 𝕏Burgum wrote on X, “befitting the most powerful Capital in the World.”
Vomit.
What’s striking is that work is beginning before the project has received final approval from the National Capital Planning Commission. The commission approved the location and preliminary plans in July but is expected to consider the project again this fall. The U.S. Commission of Fine Arts—which is composed entirely of Trump appointees—has already given the design preliminary approval.
The National Park Service has also backed the project, despite its own review concluding that an arch of this scale would adversely affect historic sightlines involving the Lincoln Memorial, Arlington House, the Washington Monument, Jefferson Memorial and numerous other landmarks. Those visual relationships were deliberately incorporated into Washington’s monumental landscape over generations, and the Park Service acknowledges that the arch would disrupt them.
Meanwhile, three veterans and an architectural historian are suing to stop the project, arguing that a monument of this magnitude requires congressional authorization that Trump does not have. The Justice Department is seeking dismissal of the lawsuit, while the plaintiffs’ attorney says they may ask the court to intervene now that excavation is imminent. The arch is part of Trump’s much broader effort to remake Washington into a capital that would make Saddam Hussein blush, which includes the $400 million White House ballroom complex, changes to the Kennedy Center, renovations to the Reflecting Pool and redevelopment of an East Potomac Park golf course.
The larger issue, of course, isn’t simply whether Washington needs a triumphal arch (it doesn’t). It’s whether a president can substantially reshape some of the country’s most important civic and historic spaces by fiat. With excavation about to begin while a lot of questions remain unresolved, the administration is obviously determined to steamroll over any opposition, making it increasingly difficult to reverse with every shovel of dirt.
The Republican Congress and Supreme Court continue to stand by and watch while Trump does whatever the hell he wants.
