President Trump officially presented plans for a triumphal arch in honor of America’s 250th birthday next year while he thanked donors on Wednesday for helping his dream of a White House ballroom become a reality.
The arch, already nicknamed the Arc de Trump, mirrors that of Paris’ Arc de Triomphe. A model he displayed at the dinner showed two eagles and a gold Lady Liberty atop it.
It would sit across from the Lincoln Memorial over a traffic circle that brings people into the city from Virginia.
“That’s Arlington Memorial Bridge. … And at the end of it, you have a circle that was built 150 years ago,” Mr. Trump said to dinner attendees in the East Room. “In fact, they put a couple of columns on each side. You have two columns on one side, two columns on the other, but yet, in the middle, just a circle. And everyone in the past had said something was supposed to be built there. That’s true. But a thing called the Civil War interfered. That’s a good reason.”
He showed the wealthy attendees small, medium and large models of the arch and said he liked the large one best.
“Why are you shocked to hear that?” he joked to laughter from the audience.
The president didn’t provide any details about the cost or the timeline for the project.
The Washington Times has reached out to the White House for comment.
Photos of the proposed arch circulated last week after the model was spotted on Mr. Trump’s desk in the Oval Office on more than one occasion.
The plans were first presented to the president earlier this year, and he was enthusiastic about the idea, The Washington Post reported.
A picture of the arch design was also posted on X by Nicolas Charbonneau, an architect at Harrison Design, which says it “specializes in high-end residential architecture, interior design and landscape architecture.”
“A proposal for a triumphal arch in DC for #America250, in the traffic circle in front of Arlington National Cemetery. America needs a triumphal arch!” Mr. Charbonneau wrote on X last month.
Mr. Trump’s fellow diners are funding his $200 million, 90,000-square-foot ballroom that he has wanted for years.
He has long said the White House needs a ballroom to hold state dinners and host foreign dignitaries.
“For all those years, they wanted it, and now they’re going to get it, and because of you, they’re going to get it. And me too; we’re all in this together,” he said of the ballroom.
“I have so many friends, and so many of you have been really, really generous. I mean, a couple of you … here saying, ’Sir, would $25 million be appropriate?’ I said, ’I’ll take it.’”
Guests included representatives from Lockheed Martin, Microsoft, Meta Platforms, Alphabet’s Google, Apple, Amazon and Palantir Technologies, plus oil magnate Harold Hamm, Blackstone CEO Steve Schwarzman and bitcoin billionaires Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, The Wall Street Journal reported.
• Mallory Wilson can be reached at mwilson@washingtontimes.com.
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