By The Washington Times (Politics) | Created at 2026-08-12 21:41:08 | Updated at 2026-08-12 22:43:15
2 hours ago
White House officials have asked the Justice Department to determine whether a new criminal case can be brought against a former Olympian over vandalizing the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool.
David Hearn already has had charges against him dropped, but the Justice Department is now probing whether another type of case, such as a misdemeanor, is possible.
The White House-to-DOJ discussions surfaced right after Todd Blanche was confirmed as attorney general amid senators’ concerns he would defer to Mr. Trump, according to multiple reports.
U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Jeanine Pirro abandoned prosecution against the 67-year-old, three-time Olympic canoeist after documents showed that the damage was caused by a “botched” refurbishing project championed by President Trump.
The government determined that “it is difficult to attribute the widespread damage to the Reflecting Pool to vandalism, let alone to establish that fact beyond a reasonable doubt,” according to court filings.
The now-defunct indictment stated that Mr. Hearn “maliciously did injure, break and destroy” the pool’s lining.
Mr. Hearn had said he reached into the water during a June bike ride to touch a piece of the blue coating that was already detached from the bottom. He said he runs a waterproofing business and was examining the detached liner rather than vandalizing it.
While Mr. Hearn was originally charged with a misdemeanor, prosecutors later heightened the offense to a felony.
After Ms. Pirro admitted that the felony charge was ill-informed, she was spotted visiting the White House carrying a box of evidence collected from the Interior Department that exonerated Mr. Hearn and several others.
Mr. Trump said on Truth Social that he would “disagree 100%” with Ms. Pirro’s dropping the prosecution and that she should “revisit her hastily made decision.”
A deadline is looming over whether to file a new charge, as the case’s presiding judge is slated to hold a hearing in September on whether the dismissal of charges against Mr. Hearn should be “with prejudice.”
The judge set an Aug. 18 deadline for the government to respond on the prejudice question.
In the prosecution’s request to dismiss the charges, Ms. Pirro requested it be “without prejudice,” meaning prosecutors could later revisit the same alleged conduct.
“The Department of Justice follows the evidence when determining if crimes have been committed,” a department spokesperson said. “We always evaluate any case based on the facts and the law.”
Norm Eisen, co-counsel for Mr. Hearn, said a new prosecution “would mark a shocking first: Bringing back from the dead a case that the DOJ lost by its own admission that it lacked the evidence to convict.”
“This would add another bizarre turn to a sad chapter in the DOJ’s history — and further harass an innocent man,” he said in a statement.
Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, announced an investigation concerning the charges against Mr. Hearn, a constituent of the Maryland Democrat.
“Did DOJ prosecutors knowingly bring a bogus indictment? Did DOI withhold key evidence to blame the disastrous pool renovation on an innocent man? Did President Trump pressure or influence either Department to retaliate against and scapegoat an American citizen?” he wrote in a Tuesday letter.
“At a minimum, it appears that members of the Trump administration were ready and willing to imprison an innocent American for a decade in a desperate effort to soothe an ex-landlord’s wounded ego about a terrible paint job and wasteful contract,” he said.
Interior officials reportedly flagged the peeling liner internally as early as June 11, more than a week before Mr. Hearn’s arrest, but did not turn that email over to prosecutors until after the indictment.
In the letter to Interior Secretary Doug Burgum and Ms. Pirro, Mr. Raskin demanded all records regarding the decision to prosecute Mr. Hearn.
That includes the decision to charge him with a felony, communications about the prosecution among Justice, Interior and White House officials, and evidence presented to the grand jury.
