Trump Convenes Final Review for Triumphal Arch After ‘Blue Tsunami’

President Donald Trump’s planned 250-foot-tall triumphal arch could win approval as soon as Thursday, after he bulldozed a mountain of opposition to secure a final review by a federal commission. Approval would clear the way for construction to begin immediately, though a federal judge could still block the project, as some on Capitol Hill hope.

Washington, D.C., media reported that the Trump-allied National Capital Planning Commission began reviewing plans for the arch on Thursday afternoon, just two days after Republicans lost control of the Senate and the House of Representatives in seismic midterm elections. The commission is expected to approve the plans following lengthy public testimony. Meanwhile, the project’s opponents have called on the federal courts to halt it before construction can begin.

“The Court should not allow this lawless project to evade scrutiny,” Brian Schwalb and Jay Jones, the attorneys general of D.C. and Virginia, respectively, wrote in a joint court filing on Wednesday, as reported by the Washington Post.

The structure would rise at Memorial Circle, between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington National Cemetery, to a height that critics say would cast shadows over the surrounding memorial landscape at various times of day. In recent weeks, the president has reimagined the project as a “military complex,” complete with a sniper’s nest.

Trump first announced plans for the triumphal arch more than a year ago, presenting it as a necessary tribute to the nation’s 250th anniversary. A project of this magnitude would traditionally require congressional approval, which the president has not sought. D.C. lawmakers, historic preservationists, and veterans’ groups argue that the project has been illegally advanced and threatens the site’s solemn character.

In a lawsuit filed last month, the Arlington County Board argued that the arch would “directly obstruct[ing] the line of sight between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington National Cemetery that was deliberately created to symbolize the nation’s post-Civil War reunification.”

The Trump administration maintains that the arch is authorized by century-old plans approved by Congress to commemorate the nation’s reunification after the Civil War. Critics, however, have pointed out that the lawmakers’ plans called for a pair of columns, not a triumphal arch of the kind the president has likened to France’s Arc de Triomphe, “but better, more beautiful actually, much more beautiful.”

Mark Paoletta, a White House official who was appointed commission chairman in August, reportedly said on Thursday that the empty space at Memorial Circle “dishonors our veterans and leaves a key monumental gateway to Arlington that Congress authorized uncompleted.” He added that it was a “national disgrace” that such a landmark was not already standing, praising the president’s “historic vision.”

The Arlington County Board’s lawsuit, which names the National Park Service, as a defendant, accuses the administration and its official of failing to consider the arch’s potential risks to regional flight paths and its impact on emergency services.

“Using the Arch to store large stockpiles of ammunition and as a staging point for drones and snipers, so close to commuters and tourists, will dramatically worsen these public-safety harms and the risk of accidents,” the lawsuit warns.