Will a different contractor be hired by 6/25 to repair the custer f#ck that is the DC reflecting pool?

No new independent contractor was brought in to fix the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool by the June 25 deadline. The pool, which the Trump administration renovated at an eventual cost exceeding $16 million, began displaying bright green algae blooms and floating paint chips within weeks of its refilling — the product of a hot, humid June in Washington and what critics called a botched painting job on the concrete bottom.

The National Park Service had originally awarded two no-bid contracts: Atlantic Industrial Coatings handled the waterproofing and blue paint treatment, while Greenwater Services — owned by John Cafaro, a Mar-a-Lago neighbor of former President Trump — took on the water purification system. When problems emerged, the government issued an emergency contract worth $1.74 million to Green Water Solutions LLC, also a Cafaro-owned entity, for a nano-bubble filtration system. This was not a different, independent contractor; it was another firm from the same family of companies. The top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee sent letters demanding water quality records and contract details from the contractors, but no outside remediation firm independent of the existing relationship was engaged by June 25. Community members, who voted 39% yes, had modest expectations that a change would occur — and the majority correctly sensed the status quo would hold.