President Donald Trump’s proposed triumphal arch project received overwhelmingly negative feedback from preservationist groups and members of the public as plans for the massive structure were presented on Thursday to a key committee for the first time.
But the Commission of Fine Arts still appears poised to approve the project and took a preliminary vote to move ahead with the process. The independent federal agency, which has been stacked with Trump loyalists, advises the president and Congress on design plans for monuments, memorials, coins and federal buildings.
Trump has been deeply involved in the project to build an arch as he takes significant steps to impose his style and taste on the nation’s capital during his second term. He has already added his name to the Kennedy Center and the US Institute of Peace and is overseeing a major ballroom addition to the White House complex.
“This is personal for the president,” Commission of Fine Arts Chairman Rodney Mims Cook, Jr., said at the meeting.
In a sign of its importance to the president, Interior Secretary Doug Burgum unveiled renderings for the 250-foot arch, which would be 165-feet tall and 165-feet wide, with a 25-foot pedestal and a massive 60-foot gilt bronze Lady Liberty sculpture on top, boasting that it would “strengthen the city’s symbolic architectural vocabulary.”
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