Trump orders new, blue floor for Washington’s Reflecting Pool

The mission — a part of the capital metropolis’s sprucing up forward of the nation’s 250th anniversary celebrations on July 4 — will price about $1.5 million and take roughly three weeks, Trump advised reporters Thursday.

The 2,000-foot (610-meter) pool between the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial “was in terrible shape,” stated Trump, who was a long-time actual property developer earlier than getting into politics.

“It was filthy, dirty and it leaked like a sieve for many years,” he stated in a White House video in regards to the plan.

Built in 1922-1923, the pool has turn into a key landmark within the US capital. Civil rights icon Martin Luther King Jr delivered his well-known “I Have a Dream” speech overlooking the reflecting pool in 1963.

Trump stated he rejected a proposal to switch the stone within the backside, a plan he stated would price $300 million and take three years.

Instead, he contacted contractors he had beforehand used, they usually stated utilizing the swimming pool floor would price a lot much less and be accomplished in a fraction of the time.

“I’ve built more than 100 swimming pools in different buildings,” Trump advised reporters, referring to his mission as “a business study.”

The contractors have cleaned the underside and begun pouring the “industrial-grade” substance and might be completed in a matter of days, he stated.

“You’re going to end up with a beautiful, beautiful reflecting pool, the way it’s supposed to be. Much better than it ever was,” he stated.

Trump has launched into a number of different main renovations in Washington, together with demolishing the East Wing of the White House, the place he goals to construct an enormous ballroom.

© 2026 AFP