The U.S. Commission of Fine Arts approved the design concept for a Trump Arch on Thursday, moving the proposed monument one step forward in Washington even as the project drew unanimous written opposition and an active federal lawsuit.
The panel also approved plans to paint the gray granite exterior of the Eisenhower Executive Office Building and to build an underground facility for security screenings of tourists and other guests. The arch would rise 250 feet from its base to a torch held aloft by a Lady Liberty-like figure, with two eagles at her sides and four lions at the base, all gilded. Gold lettering reading “One Nation Under God” and “Liberty and Justice for All” would run along the top, and a public observation deck would offer 360-degree views of the city.
That design is still only part of a longer approval process. The commission said it will review updated versions of all three projects at a future meeting before any final votes, which means Thursday’s action was not the last stop but the first formal green light.
Interior Secretary Doug Burgum cast the arch as a missing piece in the capital, saying Washington is the only major Western world capital without such a monument and describing the proposed setting as a “barren, grass-covered, lonely traffic circle.” He also called the Eisenhower Executive Office Building “one of the most beautiful buildings anywhere in Washington” and said of the arch, “I think it’s just incredible, but you.” Davis Ingle said the move was “another step in accomplishing President Trump’s promise to the American people from the campaign trail — to Make America Safe and Beautiful Again.”
But the objections were plain inside the room. Three of four people who gave public comment opposed the arch largely because of its size, and Thomas Luebke, the commission’s secretary, said it received about 1,000 written comments, all opposing the project. James McCrery II, the commission’s vice chairman, said he preferred the arch without the figure and eagles on top and objected to the lions at the base, calling them “not a beast natural to the North American continent.”
The fight is already in court. A group of veterans and a historian has sued in federal court to block construction, arguing that the arch would disrupt the sightline between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington House at Arlington National Cemetery. The proposed site is Columbia Island, federal land managed by the National Park Service under the Interior Department. With the commission’s first approval in hand, the real battle now shifts to the next design review and the courtroom, where the monument’s future will be tested on both aesthetics and law.