President Trump Turned Off Their Money Spigot, and Now They're Suing Him Over Blue Paint

It's a day ending in "y," which means yet another Democrat-adjacent organization is suing President Trump, this time around for daring to improve the appearance of the Reflecting Pool, which glitters to the east side of the Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.

Except, the pool hasn't been all that glittery of late, leading the president to initiate a massive cleanup project, including the application of a fresh coat of blue paint to enhance its appearance. He also cleaned up a $300 million plan by the Biden administration to replace all of the granite at the bottom of the pool; the paint job, by contrast, costs $1.5 million, according to the president.

The group suing the administration, The Cultural Landscape Foundation (TCLF), wants to put a halt to the Reflecting Pool painting project, claiming "the current application of blue paint to the basin of Reflecting Pool on the National Mall is being done in violation of federal law." The 26-page complaint continues, "Every day that the resurfacing continues, the historic character of the Reflecting Pool is being further and fundamentally altered."

The Cultural Landscape Foundation today sued the Department of the Interior over the painting of the Reflecting Pool on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. https://t.co/KTVeZMflNw

📸 Reflecting Pool, Washington, D.C. - Photo by G. Edward Johnson, 2026 pic.twitter.com/csylSuYP5R
— The Cultural Landscape Foundation (@TCLFdotORG) May 11, 2026

"Changing the Reflecting Pool’s color, a key character-defining feature of the site, which is listed in the National Register of Historic Places," argues TCLF, "should be subject to reviews pursuant to Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966 and other laws."

The group defines "cultural landscapes" as "works of art, narratives of culture, and expressions of regional identity." They have been publicly critical of President Trump's plans to build a ballroom in the East Wing of the White House and construct a triumphal arch near Arlington National Cemetery, writing the projects would change "the face of the nation’s capital."

Sen. John Fetterman Just Said What Democrats Don’t Want to Hear About Themselves

(They're probably also irked that the president and his motorcade drove directly into the empty Reflecting Pool last week for an up-close look at the project and to meet with the laborers doing the hard work on it.)

All of this could just be passed off as Democrats doing Democrat things – anything Trump does or says, they'll say or do the exact opposite – except for one thing: TCLF has a big axe to grind against the Trump administration. And that's because The Cultural Landscape Foundation lost hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of federal grants last year after DOGE came onto the scene. From TCLF's own 2025 year-in-review:

Early in the year, the new administration’s priorities resulted in the cancellation of a $30,000 National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) grant and a $185,000 National Park Service (NPS) grant that were awarded to TCLF.

It all starts making more sense now, right? TCLF is just one of many left-leaning NGOs who are still bitter over Trump's attempts to eliminate waste, fraud, and abuse in the federal government – and he must pay for it. And groups like this are more than happy to waste their donors' money to do the dirty work of the Democrat Party.

Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA), who seems to be the only one with the courage to stand athwart his party, took to X to implore his side to stop with the TDS-induced psychosis and never-ending lawsuits.

Stop this henpecking.

$13M? This is an iconic American place and was in serious disrepair.

Get over the TDS and celebrate this is getting done for our 250th. 🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/X5PcTHfv8h
— U.S. Senator John Fetterman (@SenFettermanPA) May 11, 2026

This isn't likely to be the last we'll be hearing from the folks at TCLF and their litigators as President Trump eyes a paint job for the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, which is part of the White House complex.

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