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The U.S. Attorney’s Office for Washington, D.C. has dropped all charges against individuals it had previously claimed engaged in acts of “vandalism” at the Lincoln Memorial reflecting pool, despite President Donald Trump’s continued insistence — without evidence — that they were responsible for the damage.
The move comes just days after the office of U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro dropped charges against former Olympian David Hearn, who was among those accused of vandalizing the pool.
Pirro, a former Fox News personality and staunch Trump loyalist, faces the possibility of being fired by Trump for her office’s decisions.
Pirro’s office filed a motion ending its case against Hearn on Friday night, noting that evidence that he vandalized the pool was severely lacking. Rather, “the damage was the result of a botched installation,” the filing stated.
The filing referenced documents from the Interior Department. While the department had publicly backed Trump’s claims that vandals were to blame for the pool’s condition, Interior documents showed that the chipped blue paint had actually come loose as a result of work performed by the company Trump had hired to make repairs.
“Given all of this newly discovered information, it is difficult to attribute the widespread damage to the Reflecting Pool to vandalism,” the filing added.
Trump reacted negatively to the news of Pirro’s office dropping charges against Hearn.
“I disagree 100 percent with Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, on the Reflecting Pool,” Trump said in a Truth Social post on Saturday. “I don’t know what she was thinking? To me, it was a pure case of VANDALISM.”
Trump’s post included a video of a person dipping their hand into the pool, but it did not definitively show them purposely damaging it.
On Monday, Pirro’s office dropped charges against the remaining three individuals who were charged with vandalism.
David Benowitz, a lawyer for one of those charged with causing damage to the reflecting pool, described the government’s case as bogus.
“We were all at the pool, there’s no slashes,” Benowitz said, adding that there were “flawed seams” in the monument, and that the government “literally fabricated a crime” against his client and others who were charged.
“This was the epitome of the politicization of the criminal justice system,” Benowitz concluded.
Trump continued his criticism of Pirro on Monday.
“I was disappointed in Jeanine Pirro. Really disappointed in Jeanine Pirro. She folded like an umbrella,” Trump told reporters, adding that she “choked” in her decision-making.
Trump’s comments led to speculation that he was going to fire Pirro. On Monday night, Pirro did indeed meet with Trump at the White House, leaving with her job intact, for now. According to sources familiar with his thinking, Trump has been considering removing Pirro from her U.S. Attorney position.
Meanwhile, Trump has threatened members of the press for not parroting his baseless claims that the reflecting pool was vandalized.
Last month, as ABC News was covering the growth of bright green algae and paint chips coming off the bottom of the pool, Trump said the project “came out great,” but that vandals were to blame for its condition. Because that network (and other news media) correctly noted that there was no visible evidence of vandalism, Trump promised retaliation.
“We are preparing lawsuits against ABC for false reporting,” he said.
Those lawsuits have yet to materialize.
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