Not my presidentโฆ.
Reflecting Pool Repairs to Cost $13.1 Million. Trump Had Promised $1.8 Million.
Source: NYT
President Trump said that his handpicked contractor would charge only $1.8 million to repair the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool and paint it blue.
The actual cost is now more than seven times that, after the Interior Department nearly doubled the size of the contract late last week, federal records show.
On Friday, the Interior Department added $6.2 million to the contractโs previous cost, saying it now planned to pay $13.1 million to a Virginia firm called Atlantic Industrial Coatings. President Trump said he chose that company to repair the landmark because the firm had worked on the swimming pools at his golf club in Sterling, Va.
The government awarded that firm a no-bid contract last month, bypassing the requirement to seek competing offers by saying that the situation was so urgent that any delay would cause โserious injuryโ to the government. The government has not publicly said what that injury would have been.
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/11/us/politics/reflecting-pool-paint-contract-trump.html
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Mainecat ·