Topline
President Donald Trump boosted dozens of posts from prominent supporters and right-wing accounts—retreading false claims about the 2020 elections and calling for his political enemies to be jailed—in a late-night Truth Social posting spree that was capped off with a post attacking a New York Times report about the costs of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool repairs.
Key Facts
Between 10:15 p.m. and 11:30 p.m. EDT on Monday night, Trump’s Truth Social account reshared more than 50 posts from right-wing accounts and supporters attacking former Presidents Barack Obama, Joe Biden, and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
The posts also called for the arrests of other prominent political enemies of the president, including former FBI director James Comey, former CIA Director John Brennan and special counsel Jack Smith.
The posts attacking Obama baselessly accuse the former president of plotting a coup against Trump with the Russiagate scandal and call for his arrest while labeling him a “traitor.”
Trump then boosted multiple posts promoting false conspiracies about voting machines altering the results of the 2020 elections.
Other posts called for Clinton to be sent to Haiti and reiterated Trump’s unsubstantiated claims about Biden being controlled by others using autopen signatures to make executive decisions.
Trump also reshared a post from his former National Security Advisor and prominent 2020 election denier, Michael Flynn, who wrote: “We had a fake president for 4 years. Our country has yet to recover.”
Nearly all the posts were shared without comment by Trump, but he responded to one of them, demanding the DOJ arrest Trump’s political enemies for “treason,” saying: “They are working hard!”
What Did Trump Say About The Reflecting Pool Renovation?
In a post made early on Tuesday, nearly two hours after his spree of posts, the president attacked a New York Times report about the cost of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool repairs. Earlier on Monday, the Times reported the Interior Department is now preparing to pay $13.1 million for the work, significantly higher than the $1.8 million Trump claimed earlier. A Virginia-based Atlantic Industrial Coatings, which previously worked on the swimming pools at Trump’s golf clubs, was awarded a no-bid contract for the work last month. Although the Times report makes no mention of Trump’s predecessors, the president accused the paper of “trying to justify Obama and Biden’s expensively botched attempt at fixing the long broken, unsightly, and unsanitary Reflecting Pool.” Trump also attacked the Times reporter who covered the story, saying: “This is not just a paint job, like lowlife ‘reporter,’ David Fahrenthold, of the NYT so inaccurately and maliciously stated, it is a deeply complicated work of smart and beautiful construction.” The president’s post didn’t mention the Times’ finding that the cost of construction had risen to $13.1 million and instead wrote that his plan involves constructing a “far superior Reflecting Pool for 5 or 6 Million Dollars” that could be completed in “2 weeks rather than 4 years.”
Tangent
On Monday, the Cultural Landscape Foundation, a nonprofit group, sued the Trump administration in federal court to block the repair and repainting of the Reflecting Pool. In the suit, filed before the D.C. federal court, the plaintiffs argued that the repainting was “blatantly unlawful” and that the pool floor’s dark grey is a deliberate design choice. The filing notes that the dark-colored floor created the “illusion of greater depth and a more profound reflection.” In a statement, the non-profit’s President and CEO, Charles Birnbaum, said: “A blue-tinted basin is more appropriate to a resort or theme park.” The suit urges the court to block the repair work and restore the pool to its original color.
Key Background
In another late-night posting spree on Truth Social earlier this month, Trump shared a string of bizarre AI-generated images. Among them was a post depicting the president swimming shirtless in the reflecting pool, along with Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and an unidentified woman in a bikini.
