Trump administration drops Reflecting Pool case, blaming damage on ‘botched’ installation - NBC News

The Trump administration has dropped its case against former Olympic canoeist David "Davey" Hearn, who had been charged in connection with damage to the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.
In a July 31 filing, a supervisor in the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia, headed by Jeanine Pirro, said officials obtained information undermining "the evidentiary basis for the indictment."
Prosecutors said that after Hearn was indicted on July 2, the Interior Department provided additional documents indicating the June 2026 damage stemmed from flawed installation by contractor Atlantic Industrial Coatings, rather than vandalism.
The DOJ said it would not have sought a grand jury indictment had the Interior Department shared the information in its possession, adding it was "difficult to attribute the widespread damage to the Reflecting Pool to vandalism," let alone prove it beyond a reasonable doubt.
President Donald Trump publicly disagreed with the decision, writing on Truth Social that he was "100%" at odds with Pirro and maintaining the damage was "a pure case of VANDALISM," while conceding there "may have been some contractor difficulty."
Trump later posted a video of the pool, claiming the material appeared to have been "cut with a knife or a box cutter," as a spokesperson for Pirro said the filing spoke for itself.