{"id":2152,"date":"2026-06-24T08:07:17","date_gmt":"2026-06-24T08:07:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nextaddressamerica.com\/?p=2152"},"modified":"2026-06-24T08:07:17","modified_gmt":"2026-06-24T08:07:17","slug":"dc-insider-gives-up-the-game-republicans-ignore-waste-when-trump-is-responsible","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nextaddressamerica.com\/?p=2152","title":{"rendered":"DC insider gives up the game: Republicans ignore waste when Trump is responsible"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

President Donald Trump\u2019s supporters in Washington are applying a massive double standard when defending the Republican leader\u2019s mismanagement of the Reflecting Pool renovations, at least according to one prominent conservative commentator.<\/p>\n

Read more Trump has a successor in mind\u00a0 \u2014 but his base is sabotaging his big plan: conservative<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cThe pool now must be drained again for repairs, meaning even more taxpayer funds must be spent on it,\u201d wrote The Bulwark\u2019s Joe Perticone on Tuesday. \u201cSo I spoke to some of the fiscal fauxhawks on Capitol Hill about this becoming a money pit. After all, isn\u2019t this a good example of just the sort of willy-nilly government spending they ought to address?\u201d<\/p>\n

Perticone then went through a list of Republican lawmakers with whom he spoke on the subject.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is our nation\u2019s capital,\u201d Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-AL) told Perticone. \u201cEverything should look pristine.\u201d The Alabama Republican also repeated Trump\u2019s unsubstantiated claim that the Reflecting Pool has turned green with algae due to vandals.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe people, they need to be arrested and jailed and throw the key away,\u201d Tuberville argued, later responding to Perticone\u2019s observation that there is no evidence of either arrests or sabotage of the pool that \u201cthey\u2019ve arrested people.\u201d For this reason, Tuberville said there must be some sound basis for Trump\u2019s claim that the pool was vandalized, saying that \u201cI don\u2019t think they\u2019d arrest people just to be arrested.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sen. Steve Daines (R-MT) made a few concessions about the poor state of the Reflecting Pool but refused to blame Trump himself.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, I think getting the reflecting pool looking beautiful again is a good thing,\u201d Daines told Perticone, although he admitted when pressed about its current state that \u201cno, it doesn\u2019t look very beautiful. We gotta find out what went wrong with it; [it] needs to be corrected. It\u2019s a great part of the experience coming down to the Mall.\u201d<\/p>\n

Meanwhile Sen. James Lankford (R-OK) refused to answer questions about the Reflecting Pool at all.<\/p>\n

Read more Busted: MAGA politician accused of lying about donations to veterans groups<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI have no way to be able to answer that,\u201d Lankford told Perticone about the renovation. \u201cBut we do need to fix it, but I have no way to answer that. I\u2019ve not been tracking that.\u201d<\/p>\n

As Bruce Wolpe from The Conversation wrote earlier this month, Trump has made a number of attempts to renovate Washington DC monuments with mixed reception. When he unilaterally destroyed the East Wing of the White House to build a ballroom, former First Lady Hillary Clinton said, \u201cIt\u2019s not his house. It\u2019s your house. And he\u2019s destroying it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wolpe then put the controversy over the Reflecting Pool renovations into that context.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe pool has been troubled for decades with plumbing and drainage issues, algae, trash, and discoloration,\u201d Wolpe said. \u201cTrump wanted it fixed in time for America\u2019s 250th on July 4 this year. No-bid contracts with friendly associates were signed. There was cleaning, waterproofing, sealant and its now-famous \u2018American Flag Blue\u2019 color.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added, \u201cThe repairs failed within days. The algae were back, the drainage was clogged, the color was anything but blue. Trump blames vandals for trashing the pool and shredding the sealant. A former Olympian was arrested for putting his hand in the water to feel the torn strip of the blue paint.\u201d<\/p>\n

Overall, Wolpe characterized this as part of Trump\u2019s larger failure to gain control of events during his second term.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Reflecting Pool is for the people to gather, to remember, to reflect, to honour, to celebrate, to breathe,\u201d Wolpe wrote. \u201cNow, like so much in this second Trump term, it has fallen into scandal and disrepair.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more Critics cackle as Trump lackey attempts to compare president to a founding father<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

President Donald Trump\u2019s supporters in Washington are applying a massive double standard when defending the Republican leader\u2019s mismanagement of the Reflecting Pool renovations, at least according to one prominent conservative commentator.\u201cThe pool now must be drained again for repairs, meaning even…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":557,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2152","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\nDC insider gives up the game: Republicans ignore waste when Trump is responsible - Next Address America<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/nextaddressamerica.com\/?p=2152\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"DC insider gives up the game: Republicans ignore waste when Trump is responsible - 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