WASHINGTON — The Trump administration’s planned 250-foot arch at Memorial Circle, which the White House says is “intended to honor our heroes who rest in Arlington Cemetery,” drew new challengers on Tuesday: nine members of the Kennedy family, who asked a federal judge in Washington for permission to join the lawsuits seeking to stop it.
White House spokesman Davis Ingle said the administration is “confident we will be fully vindicated as this litigation proceeds.” “It is unfortunate to see that some members of the Kennedy family have joined the litigation against the Arch as the project is intended to honor our heroes who rest in Arlington Cemetery,” he said in a statement reported by NBC News. “The judiciary should not be abused to politicize a structure designed to unite our nation.”
The family members, who include seven of Robert F. Kennedy’s living children but not Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., argue that the arch would cast a shadow over the graves of their relatives at Arlington National Cemetery and block the sightline from the John F. Kennedy Eternal Flame across Arlington Memorial Bridge to the Lincoln Memorial, which they called “an essential element” of the grave’s design, according to NBC News. They told the court they have “a direct, immediate stake in this matter and claims that share common questions of law” with the cases already pending.
The request lands before U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan, who on Nov. 5 barred construction for 14 days, about an hour after the National Capital Planning Commission voted 8-4 to approve the final site and building plans. The commission’s action said it “supports the purpose of the project to celebrate America’s Semiquincentennial.” The restraining order runs to about Nov. 19 unless the judge extends or replaces it.
What the family is asking
The proposed intervenors asked to join both pending cases: one brought by Vietnam War veteran and former U.S. ambassador Michael Lemmon with other veterans and an architectural historian (No. 1:26-cv-544), and one brought by the District of Columbia and Virginia (No. 1:26-cv-3838), which Judge Chutkan has consolidated.
Their filing argues that the National Park Service and the Interior Department authorized the arch without the congressional approval the law requires, and asks the court to set aside that authorization and block construction, according to The Guardian’s account of the complaint. It also says the arch would interrupt the view between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington House, which it says “were designed to face each other to represent national reunification after the Civil War.”
“As members of the Kennedy family, intervenors have a particular interest in protecting the Kennedy Gravesites, ensuring that these Gravesites remain unimpeded as a solemn and sacred memorial to the legacy of the Kennedy family,” the filing says, NBC News reported.
In a statement, Rory Kennedy and Maxwell Kennedy said the request was about “protecting sacred spaces that belong to the American people.” President John F. Kennedy, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, Robert F. Kennedy, Ethel Kennedy and Sen. Edward Kennedy are buried at Arlington, The Guardian and NBC News reported.
The government’s position
The Justice Department has argued in the consolidated cases that the plaintiffs lack standing, that Congress authorized the work in a 1925 act covering the Arlington Memorial Bridge plan, and that the Supreme Court’s earlier handling of the White House ballroom case should guide the court, as The Inquisitor reported Monday. Judge Chutkan rejected the government’s reading of the 1925 act in granting the restraining order. Any ruling on the Kennedys’ motion to intervene, the veterans’ pending request for a preliminary injunction or a government appeal would appear on the docket in Lemmon v. Trump.
East Potomac: judge keeps tree-cutting order in place
In a separate case over another Washington landmark, U.S. District Judge Ana C. Reyes on Monday night refused to pause her preliminary injunction barring further tree removal at East Potomac Golf Links while the administration appeals to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. The government had argued that the tree removals were routine maintenance, The Washington Post reported, and it has said in a separate filing that any redesign of the course “remains under deliberation by the National Park Service and is progressing through the compliance processes,” according to Law&Crime.
Judge Reyes disagreed. “If—as the Government has insisted since February—park officials had planned nothing more than to manage a golf course, the Court would have stayed in the gallery. As it had for months,” she wrote. “The record, however, shows that during those same months DOI has been planning the opposite.”
Her injunction, issued in late October, bars tree removal except for an imminent threat to public safety and requires advance notice before any unscheduled closure of the course. A hearing is set for Friday on her proposal to appoint former U.S. Attorney Jessie Liu as a special master to examine government lawyers’ representations to the court, Golf Channel reported. President Trump has said the course will close for a year starting Nov. 15, Law&Crime reported.
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