Opposition To Trump’s Vanity Arch Grows

Staunch opposition to Donald Trump’s proposed vanity arch grew sharpy in early October, as veterans, residents, and workers expressed hostility to the project, and the Northern Virginia county that surrounds the site filed suit against it. On October 1 st , as NPR reported : “ Veterans, retirees and lawmakers spoke out — against its scale, its cost, its lack of Congressional approval, its gaudiness, its intrusion on nearby Arlington National Cemetery and more.” On October 7 th , per the Associated Press : “ The union representing thousands of flight attendants said Wednesday it has safety concerns about President Donald Trump’s proposed triumphal arch that will be on final approach to Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.” On October 8 th , the Washington Post reported : “ Arlington County’s local elected body sued to block construction of President Donald Trump’s planned triumphal arch on Thursday, arguing that administration officials bypassed a key review process in their push to begin work on the structure.” Rep. Don Beyer (D-VA), who represents a Northern Virginia district in the U.S. House that includes Arlington County, Arlington National Cemetery, and Ronald Reagan National Airport (DCA), today issued the following statement: “The Administration’s pursuit of Donald Trump’s deeply disrespectful arch has broken the law repeatedly, and now people from many backgrounds are banding together to fight it. I applaud Arlington County’s legal challenge, which rightly confronts the Administration’s illegal attempts to bypass legally required processes to assess the project’s impacts on the local community. Trump wants to avoid these assessments because everyone knows what an honest study would say: this arch is a costly boondoggle that would increase traffic and decrease air safety for the local community. The latter point has also been echoed by workers on the planes that fly in and out of DCA, and the safety concerns would be multiplied many times over if the structure were used as a base for military drones. The bottom line is that Trump’s arch is morally repugnant, and as his pursuit of it gets more corrupt the opposition will continue to grow.” Rep. Don Beyer is leading congressional efforts to block construction of Trump’s arch. His Northern Virginia district includes the Arlington National Cemetery, where his parents, grandparents, and sister are buried . He is the author of the Arlington National Cemetery Viewshed Protection Act , which would explicitly prohibit construction of the arch. He previously raised concerns about the projects impacts on traffic in the region, which the Trump Administration has yet to address. The arch has been a consistent source of anger and concern to Beyer’s constituents, who like much of the country , vociferously oppose the project. The National Park Service’s “ Assessment of Effect ” on President Trump’s proposed 250-foot “triumphal arch” found that the arch would “adversely affect” dozens of nearby historic sites and monuments, including Arlington National Cemetery, Arlington Memorial Bridge, the Lincoln Memorial, the Washington Monument, the National Cathedral, George Washington Memorial Parkway, and many others. The proposal currently faces legal challenges, which allege that it violates the National Historic Preservation Act.