President Trump’s Closing Midterm Message Was Mostly About Proper Pool Maintenance

The National Pool Guy has spoken. 

President Donald Trump took the stage on Monday afternoon, in the closing moments of the midterm election, to deliver an extremely important message: the reflecting pool on the National Mall has, as he put it, “struggled with leaks, and algae, and very severe problems having to do with weather, and heat, and cold. 

“Believe it or not, it’s never worked,” he said of the famed decorative body of water, which has sat in the nation’s capital for decades. “And it’s never worked because it was always loaded up with leaks and problems.”

Ahead of the speech, it was assumed that the president’s remarks from the National Mall would be a final argument for the campaign, which is widely expected to end in a massive blowout for his Republican Party. However, the majority of Trump’s speech was focused on the pool and his troubled efforts to renovate it. Trump presented himself as an expert tactician and shared details about pool construction and care with the nation. Overall, the president said he was “very proud” of the botched renovation and described the event as “the official opening of the Lincoln Memorial reflecting pool.”

“The pool is now better and more beautiful than it’s ever been before,” Trump declared.  

Of course, anyone who’s followed the saga of Trump and his pool over the past several months might recall that it was seemingly fine prior to his attempt to give it a makeover. That effort, which was led by a business owned by a Trump donor, was plagued with issues that saw the pool taken over by bright green algae. 

Trump responded to that mess by making questionable and unproven claims of vandalism. His administration even pursued a criminal case against one alleged culprit that was ultimately dropped by prosecutors. During his remarks on Monday, Trump repeated his assertion that dastardly mischief makers were behind the muck. And, once again he failed to provide any convincing evidence to back up these claims. 

“We went through a lot with vandalism,” Trump said. “The vandalism was unprecedented.”

As he spoke before a small crowd that seemed mostly composed of government workers, Trump also claimed that prior presidents had failed to adequately maintain the reflecting pool. He suggested one of their solutions involved river water. And, while Trump wouldn’t explicitly say why the waterways in the Washington D.C. area were inappropriate water sources for a decorative display, his comments certainly seemed like an oblique reference to the human waste that can be discharged into the Potomac. 

“It became a very dirty, filthy, stagnant mess. It was a real problem,” Trump said of the pool, in the past. “They actually tried using the water from the Potomac — and the water from the Potomac doesn’t work because of certain reasons that I won’t go into.”

Yet the strangest thing about this speech may not have been the improbable mysterious vandals or even the roundabout presidential references to fecal matter. The fact that Trump was focused on touting his renovations and pool maintenance chops on the eve of a consequential election that will decide the balance of Congress was simply extraordinary.

At multiple points during his remarks, Trump did try to bring up his larger efforts to swarm Washington D.C. with federal law enforcement and to beautify the district with monuments that some see as dog whistles for white nationalists. Even when it came to these things, he continued to make bizarre and improbable claims, like suggesting crime had been virtually eliminated in the capital city. His boasts on that front went far beyond the figures touted by his own Justice Department in August when they cheered a 45 percent drop in homicides after federal troops took to the streets. 

“We’ve actually fixed 83 statues and fountains throughout the city,” Trump said. “Maybe the most important thing we fixed is the crime, because the crime is down close to 90%. It’ll be 100%. If there is such a thing.” 

Yet, whenever he briefly referenced issues beyond the reflecting pool, Trump quickly returned to the topic. 

“We fixed the leaks. We resurfaced the bottom in a beautiful dark blue — very dark blue. They call it ‘American Flag Blue,’ but it’s very dark,” explained Trump. “If you had a regular blue — like, I personally love the lighter color blue — but then you wouldn’t have any reflecting. It wouldn’t be a reflecting pool.”

At points, Trump even pulled out visual aids, large before and after photos of the pool prior to his passion project. His background in real estate development and his love of decoration was clear when he showed these off while delivering a long, rambling discourse on “joints,” “pipes,” “rebar,” and the difficulties of color-matching granite. 

“We installed 330,000 square feet of a very strong coating — not strong enough to withstand box knives and knives — but by normal standard pretty, pretty much the strongest coating you can get,” Trump said. 

Even as he circled back to the alleged vandalism, Trump’s various photo displays included no proof of the supposed perpetrators. Along with blaming these unseen villains, Trump suggested the two Democrats who have preceded him in office were at fault for many of the pool’s woes. 

“The joints that were here that we took out, they were put in there a long time ago and we took it out,” recounted Trump. “Obama and Biden put in much of it, but it was all very defective material. And that’s one of the reasons it leaked so badly.” 

Trump then turned to the grass around D.C.’s national monuments. He showed pictures indicating how this had indeed been vandalized with “86 47,” a slogan that Trump argued was inspired by one of his greatest rivals: former FBI Director James Comey. The Trump administration has been engaged in an effort to criminally prosecute Comey, who previously investigated the president, for making a social media post with the phrase, which is rooted in restaurant industry parlance for removing a troubled customer. But for Trump, it’s so much darker than that. 

“This was sad because this was the grass and it was totally vandalized up here,” Trump said as he held up photos of the scorched earth. “And this was put out on the surface ‘8647.’ You know what that means? That was a Comey phrase. 8647, that means ‘kill 47.’ That’s a mob expression that Comey, I guess, was the first one that I heard put it out. So, not nice.”

That incident was evidently particularly painful for Trump since he truly appreciates vibrant foliage. 

“Like the human being, grass has a life also,” the president said. 

In general, Trump framed the alleged attacks on the reflecting pool in highly emotional terms. 

“This is a massive piece of —  piece of pool. There’s never been anything like — when you look at the side — it’s the biggest anywhere in the world by far and was treated with a lot of love. Then, it was treated with a lot of hate,” Trump said, adding, “We’ve got to stop the hate.”

After over 20 minutes that were largely pure pool, Trump did indeed address tomorrow’s midterm elections. The president, who is facing historically low approval ratings amid spiking prices and an unpopular war he launched with Iran, touted his own record on foreign policy and the economy. He also trashed the Democratic Party candidates running against his allies using highly exaggerated and questionable accusations.  

“These are the most dangerous candidates ever put up. There’s never been anything like what we’re seeing jihadists and Muslim Brotherhood members and people that nobody can even believe what we’re looking at,” Trump said. 

Trump suggested voting for his fellow Republicans was a vote for the American way of life. 

“We have to keep our Congress strong, free — a little bit of apple pie, there’s something very nice about that,” said Trump. 

Yet, time and again, he returned to the theme of the pool and his various beautification projects in the nation’s capital. He claimed the makeover had stopped a wave of deadly attacks surrounding the city’s famed tourist attractions. While he didn’t share any real world examples, Trump spun a graphic vision of these horrific incidents from his mind. 

“We’re not calling people now from Iowa to tell them that their son has been killed, he’ll be coming home in a casket. Somebody from Indiana — family from Indiana — ‘I’m sorry to inform you, but your son was standing at the base of a very beautiful monument and he was killed instantly and he’ll be coming home to you in a coffin.’ We don’t do that anymore,” said Trump. 

Overall, the president made it painstakingly clear that he believes there are very violent forces swirling around D.C. — especially in the pool.

“Look, it’s not an easy thing,” Trump said as he recounted the renovations. “The algae is brutal. It forms easily.”