The planned triumphal arch on Columbia Island will stand 250 feet tall. Washington D.C.'s building height cap is 130 feet. The District's Attorney General Brian Schwalb and Virginia Attorney General Jay Jones filed suit on October 31 to stop the project, citing the Height of Buildings Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, and the Commemorative Works Act — five federal statutes in total.
Groundbreaking on D.C.'s newest monument is scheduled for November 5. Election Day.
The lawsuit, filed just five days before construction begins, accuses the Interior Department under Secretary Doug Burgum of making only "half-hearted gestures" toward regulatory compliance. The government's plan runs 106 pages. Schwalb and Jones want a federal judge to stop the bulldozers before the commission even votes on Tuesday.
The arch would sit at Memorial Circle, overlooking the Potomac River and the Lincoln Memorial. Secretary of War Pete Hegseth has described it as "a generational national defense opportunity" — a permanent monument to American military triumph, visible from the National Mall. The Interior Department announced the project on September 3, and the Commission of Fine Arts has already weighed in. Architectural historian Calder Loth is among those who've studied the design.
U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan heard a related veterans' case on October 30 and asked Justice Department lawyer Robert Stander a question that tells you everything about where the bench is leaning: "What's the harm to the government to wait three or four months?"
The harm is that three or four months is the point. The legal strategy isn't to win on the merits. It's to delay past the groundbreaking date, past the political momentum, past the symbolism of breaking earth on the anniversary of Trump's re-election. Arlington County already filed its own lawsuit on October 8. The Administrative Procedure Act claim. The National Historic Preservation Act claim. Layer after layer of procedural objection, none of which addresses whether the arch should exist — only whether enough forms were filed in the right order.
They couldn't stop Trump from winning the election. Couldn't stop the inauguration. Couldn't stop the executive orders. Couldn't stop the agenda from moving through Congress. So now they're suing a piece of architecture. Two attorneys general, five federal statutes, and a 130-foot height limit versus a 250-foot monument to a presidency they spent a decade trying to end.
The Supreme Court cleared the path on a 5-4 vote. The government filed 106 pages of plans. The groundbreaking is in four days.
Stone doesn't care about lawsuits.
