Posted on 09/11/2026 10:42:53 AM PDT by Miami Rebel
The contractor that renovated the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool has told the Trump administration that errors in its own work and flaws in the repair plan, not vandalism, caused the pool’s new blue liner to peel and break loose, according to government documents.
President Trump has repeatedly blamed vandals wielding knives or box cutters for damage to the pool’s “American flag blue” liner, even after the Justice Department dropped charges that it had brought against people accused of vandalizing the national landmark.
But the documents, which have not previously been reported, make clear that the contractor, Atlantic Industrial Coatings, found problems in both the design and the execution of the renovation. The documents include Atlantic’s reports to the government as well as daily progress updates from the National Park Service over the past two months.
Atlantic blamed its own errors in a report dated Aug. 14 and then provided more detail on Sept. 2, the documents show. The Justice Department, which had charged several people with vandalizing the pool in early July, began moving to dismiss the cases on July 31.
Because of “human oversight,” workers in some areas did not spray enough of the primer that made the layers of the liner stick together, Atlantic said in the documents. But the bigger problem, the company said, was that the repair plan laid out in the contract called for the layers of liner to include two chemicals that turned out to be incompatible.
The chemical on top reached a temperature hotter than what the compound underneath could withstand, and the heat caused the bottom layer to blister and come loose, the documents show. The contractor said it had not expected that outcome because it was very uncommon to mix the two products in that way.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
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It was still attempted vandalism. It doesn’t matter that the sloppy work aided the vandals.
So we're supposed to believe the New York Times? This doesn't explain how gashes were made in the lining.
Clearly an impeachable offense.
“The documents also show that Atlantic did blame vandals for cuts in the caulking around the pool’s edge that National Park Service workers had previously reported to the police. But the company did not link those cuts to the peeling of the blue liner on the pool’s floor, which Mr. Trump repeatedly blamed on ‘sick people’ wielding knives or razors.”
There is little doubt the we are in a cultural and political war that is on the edge of becoming a shooting one.
I don’t want to hear another word about that blasted reflecting pool’s repairs.
And I’m certain Judge Pirro agrees with me!
This contractor (pool boy) has an agenda that is his very own, and clearly not congruent with the good of our country or concerned with the success of President Trump.
I’m open to conspiracy theories as much as the next man....(on second thought, I’m not)...but how do you figure an industrial coating company has any agenda aside from selling industrial coating?
Conservatives were saying the same thing on my FB feed months ago. But Trump cultists just can’t accept it.
Boy that took a long time for that story to show up.
New York Times
It’s your Classic Coating Company Coverup Corporate Conspiracy.
So we believe the slimes or the contractor had no idea what he was doing?
At least he may have been honest enough to admit it.
Can anyone do anything right anymore?
You don’t believe it was the AntiFa-Soros-pool lining cabal?
Do you have any evidence of that?
Obviously the contractor botched the installation, causing the liner to peel.
Also obvious that leftwing “activists” were in or around the pool, pulling and/or cutting the liner to make the peeling worse. IOW, they were vandalizing it.
That vandalism is what the NYT is trying to downplay.
The contractor's lining installation was faulty.
Vandals, or at least the guy in question admitted to yanking and tearing pieces of the faulty lining.
The worthless Times (which you seem to like) doesn't what you to understand that.
And you fall for it.
Bingo!
It really can be BOTH ...
That said, hats off to the contractor willing to take his share of the responsibility. Something left wing commie vandals will NEVER do.
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