Trump's DC Makeover

Part 1 of several

The East Wing of the White House, the Reflecting Pool, the triumphal arch, the golf course in East Potomac Park, the Kennedy Center (or maybe we’ve gotten a reprieve on that one) — honestly this town is looking like a construction zone with cranes and fencing and jersey barriers everywhere. You’ve probably been reading about these projects from all the major news sources but in service to you, dear reader, I decided to see what I could document myself. So I laced up my sneakers and made sure I had plenty of money on my Metro card and headed out.

I decided to make my first stop one that has received less attention: the renovation of Freedom Plaza. For those of you who are not local, Freedom Plaza is a block-long expanse of granite and marble along Pennsylvania Avenue between 14th and 13th Streets NW. Per the National Park Service’s (NPS) own page (and you can find a very nice “before” picture there), the plaza was completed in 1980 as Western Plaza and then renamed in 1988 to commemorate the fact that Martin Luther King, Jr. , at the time of his assassination, had plans to hold a demonstration on the site. Noted architect Robert Venturi designed the space, which due to its location close to the White House and across the street from the Wilson Building, DC’s city hall, is often the site of protests and rallies.

Last winter, the Park Service announced the closure of Freedom Plaza (along with various other federal parks in the city) “to restore fountains, rehabilitate historic landscapes and address aging park infrastructure” with the anticipated finish date of May 15. But as of this past week, the chain link and tarps are still up and it looks like a lot more is going. It’s kind of tough to get a comprehensive view from ground level — you’d really need a room at the JW Marriott or a sweet office in the Wilson Building to take it all in — but I did my best.

It’s also kind of tough to sort out what is going on but let’s just say, the state of Freedom Plaza touches on a bunch of themes that will have you tearing out your hair. So let’s do it. And don’t take my word for it. I’ve included a lot of links so you can learn more if you so choose.

Honoring America’s slaveholders

The biggest change you can see at Freedom Plaza even while peering through the fence is the addition of multiple statues, some gilded just as our president likes. Where once the plaza was wide open with a map of the District embedded in the surface, it’s now carved up into squares alternating between grass and stone, and cluttered with statues, most prominently an equestrian statue of Caesar Rodney. (Caveat: there has long been an equestrian statue at the east end of the plaza depicting Casimir Pulaski, a Polish nobleman who became a general in the Continental Army and per legend, at one point, saved George Washington’s life. But the Pulaski statue is hidden among some trees and doesn’t dominate the site.)

But back to Rodney. I’d never heard of him. If you grew up in Delaware, you might have learned about him in grade school because his main claim to fame is that he raced from Wilmington to Philadelphia on horseback in order to sign the Declaration of Independence. More recently, amid the Black Lives Matters protests in 2020, this statute was removed from its prominent placement in downtown Wilmington due to Rodney having enslaved more than 200 people. It sat in storage until now for what is being billed as a temporary installation to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. (For more information, check out this New York Times story from February.) So yes, by all means, let’s erase any concept of freedom associated with the struggle for civil rights and whitewash it with prominent placement of this dude.

Other than Rodney, I can’t tell you who these statues and no amount of Internet sleuthing can tell us. Presumably these men (and yes they are all men) are heroes of the American Revolution. But we’ll have to wait until the site is reopened to know for sure.

Use of federal resources for NPS properties

The President’s fiscal year 2027 budget proposes a 25 percent cut in funding for the National Park Service, despite the fact that parks nationwide are suffering from years of deferred or forgotten maintenance. Yet somehow the Administration is pulling out all the stops to, in its words “Make DC Safe and Beautiful,” often at the expense of other parks. The New York Times documented that almost $70 million raised from park user fees is being spent on projects like this one, often via no-bid contracts in order to hurry up the work and get it done before the Fourth of July.

I suppose I should be happy that the parks closest to me are getting attention but it really just gives me the ick. I’m not alone in this. Recently a giant sign that said “Thanks President Trump” on fencing hiding maintenance work underway in Logan Circle was defaced within hours. When I went by there last week, the sign was gone, replaced only by the Freedom 250 signs that are popping up all over town.

Honestly seems weird that "experience your America" has been trademarked by the National Park Service

Lack of transparency

It would be nice to know more about all of this. Who are we honoring and why? What does “temporary” mean? How are resources being spent? Are they consistent with past timelines and priorities for maintenance, or is this just all a reflection of whatever Donald Trump dreams up on a random Tuesday? For an administration that claims to be the most transparent in history, there’s a lot we don’t know. And don’t just take my word for it. Real journalists for outlets including our local NBC and ABC affiliates as well as MSNow haven’t been able to wheedle any information from federal officials about the statues. I guess we will wait and see when the fence comes down if there are plaques telling us more.

But that’s just part of a bigger story. I’ll be back next week with more narrative and pictures regarding some of the other Trump vanity projects underway around town. Stay tuned!