By Jim Thomas | Friday, 24 April 2026 08:17 PM EDT
Interior Secretary Doug Burgum announced on Friday that crews are applying an “American flag blue” coating to the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool as part of a $1.5 million renovation project declared by President Donald Trump Thursday.
Burgum stated the work would be completed well before the United States’ 250th anniversary on July 4.
The update follows ongoing legal challenges to President Trump’s separate, larger construction initiative: a $400 million White House ballroom project.
On social media platform X, Burgum posted, “Renovations are underway!” and praised Trump for “investing in our capital,” adding the pool would “look better than ever.”
During an Oval Office event focused on drug pricing Thursday, President Donald Trump detailed that contractors had scrubbed the granite basin, applied grout, and begun installing what he described as an industrial-grade swimming pool surface in “American flag blue.”
Trump estimated the project would cost between $1.5 million and $2 million and be finished “long before July 4.” He noted the administration rejected a previous proposal to replace the pool’s 1920s granite, which he claimed would have cost approximately $300 million and taken three years.
Trump mentioned using contractors he knew from private real estate work for the project. He told reporters, “You’re going to end up with a beautiful, beautiful reflecting pool, the way it’s supposed to be. Much better than it was, actually.”
The 2,030-foot-long, six-acre Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, designed by Henry Bacon and located east of the memorial, was last comprehensively renovated in 2012 under a $34 million project funded by Obama-era stimulus money.
This renovation effort is part of a broader initiative launched by President Trump with an executive order issued on March 28, 2025. The order directed Interior Secretary Burgum and the National Park Service to clean up federal properties in Washington ahead of the semiquincentennial.
The administration has also implemented measures including a public safety task force, National Guard deployments in Washington, D.C., and restoration projects at federal fountains, parks, and golf courses.
Trump’s proposed fiscal year 2027 budget includes an additional $10 billion for his Presidential Capital Stewardship Program.
While the pool project moves forward, President Trump’s signature White House construction effort faces a federal court block. U.S. District Judge Richard Leon ruled in March that the $400 million East Wing ballroom could not proceed above ground without congressional approval, stating no statute authorized it. On April 16, Leon reaffirmed this ruling, rejecting arguments that national security concerns covered the entire structure while permitting work on underground bunkers and security facilities.
The District of Columbia Circuit Court had temporarily allowed above-ground construction to resume before sending the case back for clarification. The National Trust for Historic Preservation, which filed suit in December, supports a split approach allowing some construction.
