A federal judge blocked for 14 days, late Thursday night, the start of construction of an imposing memorial arch planned by the Trump administration, in a setback for one of President Donald Trump’s most prominent projects in his vision to reshape Washington.
The temporary restraining order was issued by Judge Tanya Chutkan of the U.S. District Court after final approval of the arch by the National Capital Planning Commission (NCPC) by 8 votes to 4, at the end of a nine-and-a-half-hour hearing marked by broad opposition to the construction.
The administration had said it could begin the work as soon as approval came, the Interior Department authorized the project, and the National Park Service published the proper notice.
When granting the suspension, Chutkan said that Virginia and the District of Columbia demonstrated that the imminence of construction would cause real harm to the plaintiffs. “The harm is certain,” she wrote, citing information that the work could begin as early as November 5, 2026. Virginia and D.C. warned of traffic distortions and potential impacts on mutual-aid emergency calls.
The magistrate also stated that, with the start of construction, Washington’s Department of Transportation (DDOT) would incur significant, unrecoverable costs to manage temporary detours, accidents, and breakdown-prone vehicles.
She ordered the government to file a status report by next Monday to demonstrate that it is complying with the order.
The decision came a little more than an hour after the hearing ended. The commission’s vote split between federal and local representatives: those in favor work for the government or are allied with the president, who advocated immediate start, while the opponents represented the city of Washington.
The remote hearing, conducted by teleconference, experienced instabilities in the early hours and a broadly negative comments section. Witnesses said the arch would compromise the solemnity of the nearby Arlington National Cemetery, where hundreds of thousands of military personnel and veterans are buried.
The chair of the commission, Mark Paoletta, praised the project and said that “it is important for our national identity to show who we are through great monuments.” He added that Trump often says that “the great cities of the world have arches, such as Paris, Rome and London.”
Commissioner Paul Ingrassia, attorney for the General Services Administration, stated that the arch “has nothing to do with politics” and that it would be a tribute to veterans.
Meanwhile, the president of the Washington City Council, Phil Mendelson, argued that the project did not receive the required approval from Congress and did not have funds allocated. According to him, the plan presented to the commission does not mention military use cited by Trump and by members of the administration.
The arch is one of several projects in Washington associated with Trump, ranging from the renovation of a public golf course to threats to demolish the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. The initiatives could face closer scrutiny after the Democrats won control of Congress in the midterm elections this week.
Representative Jared Huffman, Democrat from California and future chair of the House Natural Resources Committee, called the project imprudent and illegal. He said the arch would be “a tribute to Donald Trump,” not to veterans, and compared the monument to those erected for emperors or kings.
The government contends that Congress paved the way decades ago for a memorial at the site, an argument repeated by members of the commission as they approved the project. Chutkan rejected this thesis: she said it was unlikely that a 100-year-old law would contain an authorization, unknown to previous administrations, to erect a 250-foot (about 76 meters) arch at a central point in the capital, which would indicate how far the government needs to stretch the interpretation to justify the work.
