Trump Fills Rose Garden With Donor-Loaned Founder Statues
Trump Fills Rose Garden With Donor-Loaned Founder Statues
The News
President Donald Trump has remade the White House Rose Garden, replacing its lawn with a white stone patio and installing five statues of America's founders just off the Oval Office.
One of them — a statue of George Washington — was lent by Harlan Crow, the Texas real estate tycoon and Republican megadonor best known for the gifts and trips he provided to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.
Two others, of Benjamin Franklin and Alexander Hamilton, came from donors the White House identifies only as anonymous.
What Is In The Garden Now
Five sculptures stand on the new patio: Washington, Hamilton, Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and a work titled "Freedom's Charge."
"Freedom's Charge" is a 14-foot-tall bronze depicting two Revolutionary War soldiers and a flag.
The White House says the redesign mirrors the outdoor space at Trump's Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida.
Timeline
During Trump's first term, first lady Melania Trump arranged the placement of a work by Japanese American artist Isamu Noguchi near the Rose Garden — the first inclusion of an Asian American artist in the White House collection, according to The Independent.
In this term, Trump replaced the Rose Garden's plush lawn with the white stone patio.
The statues followed, turning the space from a garden of flowers into a display of founders.
Reactions
The White House frames the project as an aesthetic upgrade modeled on Mar-a-Lago.
Coverage of the remodel agrees on the facts but splits on the lead: The Independent centers the aesthetic overhaul of a space long associated with Jacqueline Kennedy, while Fortune foregrounds Harlan Crow's involvement.
The financing is the sore point. A historically significant space used for presidential ceremonies and announcements has been partly refitted with items from donors the public cannot name, which raises questions about transparency and influence.
What's Next
Trump is also planning a National Garden of American Heroes near the National Mall, with 250 statues.
Several preservation groups have sued to block that project, arguing Congress must authorize it first.
Unanswered: who the anonymous donors behind the Franklin and Hamilton statues are, what disclosure rules apply to gifts or loans to the White House, and how many more statues the Rose Garden will get.
More
The Rose Garden work is one piece of a broader set of White House renovations under Trump, including a gilded makeover of the Oval Office and a new ballroom and helipad on the south grounds.
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