Washington: There is a classic episode of the radio program This American Life that attempts to diagnose the elements of a fiasco. It asks: What elevates a situation from mere ordinary chaos or disaster to the “more ethereal, specialised realm of fiasco”?
The Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool saga surely qualifies as a case study. Not because of what happened – algae bloomed, lining peeled off – but because, as ever, it’s the cover-up that gets you in the end.
Friday’s court filing from US Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro was stunning. Again, not because it contained sensational revelations. It simply affirmed what most of us thought all along: the pool wasn’t vandalised, it was botched by the contractor.
Sadly, that’s what made the document so remarkable – it told the truth.
It did so after nearly two months of Donald Trump vehemently insisting that vandals were to blame. It did so despite this issue being close to the US president’s heart. And it made no attempt to muddy the waters and give Trump some kind of out.
Pirro wrote: “The damage was the result of a botched installation and not vandalism.”
Her filing even said the rush to get the job done in time for July 4 celebrations – pressure that came straight from the Oval Office – contributed to the problem.
It’s remarkable, also, that this came from Pirro, who has been friends with Trump for more than 30 years and was one of his staunchest (and loudest) allies.
But her own credibility was on the line here. She emphatically told reporters on July 2 that former Olympic athlete David Hearn, who had been accused of vandalising the memorial, intentionally damaged the pool. There was “tremendous evidence”, she said. It would be proven “beyond a reasonable doubt”.
Trump and his allies are adept at staring into a camera and spinning a story, no matter the facts. But you can’t do that in a courtroom. Indicting Hearn turned out to be the administration’s undoing.
And that’s where we get to the most astonishing part. Pirro’s filing makes it clear there were problems with the pool as early as mid-May, in the first two weeks of installation. A National Park Service engineer was alerted to the peeling pool lining and confirmed it in person. He filed a report to other NPS staff and the Department of the Interior that day.
Pirro’s filing states: “All of these concerns were raised by the NPS engineer on June 11, eight days before the defendant was arrested and the same day that fencing was removed from the site.”
It’s difficult to know how many people would have been made aware of this report initially. But it’s clear that once Trump started insisting it was vandalism and was being pressed for evidence, people at the NPS, the Department of the Interior and elsewhere would have had to check the facts. Well, they had them all along.
Many people must have contributed to prolonging the lie that Hearn and others vandalised the pool. Many people sat by and watched as the US government indicted a man they knew to be innocent. No one was willing to correct the record – until, facing the scrutiny of the legal system, they had to.
We know why. Still, it does not reflect well on the moral fibre of the entire administration, top to bottom.
Now it is Pirro incurring Trump’s wrath for failing to display the requisite loyalty, which, in this case, presumably would have involved misrepresenting evidence in court.
And for what? A bit of peeling floor is no catastrophe. Why spend so much time and energy on this charade? Most Republicans see it as a total own goal.
GOP strategist Melik Abdul compared it to the assault charges brought against air force veteran Sean Dunn last year for throwing a Subway sandwich at a Customs and Border Protection agent. That case, prosecuted by Pirro, actually made it to trial. The court heard the sandwich “exploded” on the victim, leaving his uniform smelling of onion and mustard. Dunn was acquitted by the jury.
It’s good that no federal prosecutor will have to embarrass themselves in court trying to lock up Hearn. But it’s scary that it got so close.
Michael Koziol is the North America correspondent for The Age and Sydney Morning Herald. He is a former Sydney editor, Sun-Herald deputy editor and a federal political reporter in Canberra.Connect via X or email.From our partners
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