What did Donald Trump do today?
He got mad that people noticed he'd made a mistake that covered eight acres of downtown Washington.
The reflecting pool in front of the Lincoln Memorial is attracting more attention than usual, as curious sightseers take in its algae-laden, bright green water. And as of today, Trump—who has spent much of the day ranting conspiracy theories about vandals—is deploying the National Guard and police to harass them.
Took this video of a guy getting detained and a citation for putting his hand in the water an hour ago.
— amanda moore 🐢 (@noturtlesoup17.bsky.social) June 20, 2026 at 5:47 PM
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The reason Trump is incensed to the point of trying to have tourists put in prison for (allegedly) even touching the water is, of course, that he just finished spending tens of millions of taxpayer dollars on a slapdash, no-bid "renovation" and bragging about the beautiful "American flag blue" that the pool would be when he was done.
When work began in May, Trump boasted that he'd put his personal "pool guys" on it, apparently on the theory that hotel swimming pools and the multi-acre granite surface of the reflecting pool were interchangeable. The White House quickly backed off of that story, given the obvious corruption of handing a no-bid contract to a Trump crony who, as it turned out, had no experience whatsoever with projects of this nature.
It was reported earlier this week that another contractor, also owned a Trump donor and Mar-a-Lago patron, got a separate no-bid contract to install water purification systems. The owner, John J. Cafaro, is no stranger to government corruption: he was previously convicted of bribing then-Rep. James Traficant of Ohio. Amusingly, the name of that company is "Greenwater Services."
Some degree of algae was always common in the pool: it is a large, shallow, warm body of stagnant water. Algae will always grow under those conditions. But Trump's hasty and technically incompetent repairs appear to have super-charged this particular bloom. The textured sprayed-on coating, which experts are pointing out is exactly the wrong sealant to have used for a large flat surface, is an ideal growth medium for algae. And filling the whole pool at once with phosphate-rich DC tap water gave the algae plenty of nutrients.
The concentrated hydrogen peroxide that armies of workers started adding this week hasn't done much to kill the algae, although it has given the pool a an appearance reminiscent of a Mark Rothko or Ellsworth Kelly painting.
It may, however, be the reason that the coating is now peeling up so quickly around the edges, with large chunks of it floating loose. (It is touching, or seeming to touch, these bits of debris that Trump is now having people arrested for.)
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| A dark blue piece of the liner floats in murky green water within reach of the edge of the Reflecting Pool. |
Trump, who reacts badly to embarrassment, has grown increasingly shrill in his posts about the pool throughout the day. By 4 PM, he was crowing about the arrests for the "serious crimes" related to "the Destruction of National Monuments," and asking "who would do such a thing? He continued posting through the evening about nonexistent "vandalism" and imaginary "250-foot" gashes in the lining, before finally admitting that the pool would have to be drained once again to fix the lining.
Trump destroyed the entire East Wing of the White House last summer, after pardoning the insurrectionist supporters who broke windows and doors to invade the Capitol Buidling and, among other things, smear their own shit all over the floor.
Why does this matter?
- It is not a federal crime to notice that Donald Trump screwed something up.
- It is not a crime to touch the water at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, although it's not the most sanitary thing to do.
- The underlying reason in this case might be comically stupid, but arresting people for embarrassing the leader is what fascist regimes do.
- You don't spend all day telling lies this obvious unless you're delusional, or you think the people listening are incredibly stupid.