Donald Trump’s planned Triumphal Arch might be intended as a monument for the ages, but a tacky mock-up of the proposed structure didn’t survive the weekend unscathed.
Trump, 80, has sparked backlash for charging ahead with plans to erect the 250-foot arch near Arlington National Cemetery, despite pushback from veterans’ groups, his own planning commission, and the public at large.
The structure forms part of a broader MAGA makeover across the nation’s capital that critics say is designed to remodel the city in Trump’s own image.
The president installed a mock-up of the arch, loosely modeled on the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, France, at his Great American State Fair—a 16-day national expo to mark the 250th anniversary of the nation’s founding. It has not held up well.
Footage of the mock-up, recorded and uploaded to X by freelance journalist Amanda Moore, itself appears to have been constructed from plywood, with its architectural features added by stapling printed vinyl sheets to its surface.
Swampy D.C. weather over the weekend has now warped the wood, with the heat, humidity, and rain causing the sheeting to stretch, wrinkle, and even peel back from the model.
“OMG! Trump’s arch thing at his state fair is barely hanging on!” one person wrote on X on Monday, sharing a video of the miniature.
“What does $100k taxpayer money for Trump’s mock up arch for the Great American State Fair get you?” another user added, suggesting the cost did “not include the duct tape and superglue.”
“When you want a triumphal arch for the 250th celebration, but you order it on Temu…,” a third person said.
“Looks like a set from a community-theater production of a play set in either Paris or ancient Rome,” a fourth chipped in.
Not everyone was happy with the waves of ridicule the snafu has prompted.
“It’s a freaking mock up you moron and it’s been out in the weather,” one pro-MAGA account posted under a video of the model arch. “You libs are the most miserable people on the planet.”
Troubles with the miniature cap a fair that has stumbled from before it even started. The 16-day event, scheduled to run through July 10, shed most of its concert lineup before the gates opened.
Poison frontman Bret Michaels and Milli Vanilli were among the acts that backed out, citing the festival’s political slant.
The fair’s opening on Thursday fared little better. A power cut stilled the event’s Freedom 250 ferris wheel and left vendors’ ice creams to melt, with crowds remaining sparse under a punishing sun.
Vanilla Ice, one of the few acts remaining to headline the fair, then had his Friday set scrapped two hours before he was due on stage because of forecast storms.
The proposed arch the model imitates has proven no less divisive. Trump unveiled the plan in October at a dinner for billionaires bankrolling his White House ballroom, currently under construction at the site where the building’s historic East Wing once stood.
Asked who the monument was for, the president reportedly had a one-word reply: “Me.”
The finished version would dwarf the Lincoln Memorial and be set on the doorstep of Arlington National Cemetery.
It is currently the target of a lawsuit by veterans’ groups, who say the plans are an insult to the memory of more than 400,000 service members buried in the cemetery.
Estimates have pegged the cost at $100 million. The National Capital Planning Commission took in close to 2,000 public comments on the proposals, “nearly all of them negative,” according to ABC News.
The arch is the latest of Trump’s capital building schemes to draw ridicule, with his $16 million overhaul of the Lincoln Memorial’s Reflecting Pool now fenced off after an algal bloom turned its intended “American Flag Blue” a sickening shade of green.
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House for comment on this story.
