Drained Reflecting Pool betrays Trump’s claim of '350-foot' gash in liner

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Visitors observe the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool through a fence as its draining continues, following renovations and Independence Day celebrations, in Washington, D.C., U.S., July 12, 2026. REUTERS/Leah Millis

The ongoing saga of the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool continued Monday as the water drained, revealing the damage that was visible. Thus far, there is no 350-foot gash in the lining.

Photos from Washington D.C., activist Joe Flood and Democratic Party strategist Matt Rein show the slow process of the pool draining. Rein's photos in particular show that as the pool drained along the parts of the pool that were reachable by the public, there were no gashes.

U.S. District Attorney Jeannine Pirro has charged individuals with intentionally damaging the pool. In one case, Olympian David Hearn was accused by Pirro at a press conference of “forcefully and violently” pulling up the Reflecting Pool liner "with both hands." But the charging documents only say he "maliciously did injure, break and destroy certain property."

"The president said that somebody took a box cutter—" a reporter began to ask during Pirro's press conference.

Pirro agreed, "Yeah." She added, "Someone intentionally did a tremendous amount of damage to the pool, and you can actually see where all the cutting is. They took a sharp object and cut for many feet along the pool."

For someone to have made such a gash, it would be along the side, unless someone jumped into the pool and began cutting the bottom.

The reporter asked Pirro if there were photos confirming her claims.

"When I file a charge, I'll be happy to show you a picture. All right? What I'm trying to do is we're trying to find out who did it. Okay? And until we get to that point, I'm not going to be able to get to that point. I'm not going to be able to you know, discuss anything more than there was tremendous damage that was caused," Pirro said at the time.

President Donald Trump went further with his box-cutter conspiracy theory, saying, without proof, that "vandals" had sliced the gash into the pool.

"No, we had vandalism ... no, vandals," Trump said at the end of June when asked about it. "We have a 290-, I think 300-foot slit right through, probably a box cutter or a knife of some kind."

For a few weeks leading up to the July 4 celebration, Trump hired a company that used a "nanobubble technology" to fix the algae problem in the Reflecting Pool. It was successful and the nanobubblers were removed for the big fireworks display. Within days, the algae was back and has remained for the past week.

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