After his party suffered a brutal loss in the 2026 midterms, Donald Trump has tried to find solace in his attempts to remake Washington, D.C. But thanks to one federal judge, Trump is beginning to learn that exerting his will over the forces of state bureaucracy may not be as easy as it once was.
Late on Thursday, Judge Tanya Chutkan of the District of Columbia brought one of Trump’s prize beautification projects to a screeching halt, ruling that construction on Trump’s triumphal arch must be stopped pending the outcome of a combined legal case that names both Trump himself and the federal National Parks Service as defendants. The timing of Chutkan’s ruling couldn’t have been worse: As it came down, the White House was in the process of rolling out a glossy new website for the project, featuring 3D renderings and sweeping views of a grand structure that now may never actually be built.
This is not Chutkan’s first run-in with Trump or his administration. In 2023, Chutkan oversaw the criminal trial against Trump for his attempt to overturn the 2020 election, a case that was only dismissed after Trump won the presidency in 2024, on the basis that the federal government could not prosecute sitting presidents.
But she hasn’t been an unequivocal Trump opponent. The following year, in 2025, Chutkan declined to block the so-called Department of Government Efficiency from accessing federal employee data, saying that the plaintiffs trying to block DOGE’s power failed to prove the agency would cause “immediate, irreparable harm.”
On this ruling, however, she did not find any merit to what the government was arguing — and her opinion was unsparing on that count.
“Defendants also assert — belatedly — that the Arch represents ‘a generational national defense opportunity,’ and that the Arch may assist in combating or deterring assassination attempts on the President,” Chutkan wrote in her ruling. “The court appreciates the government’s significant interest in national security. But these recent and unsupported attestations of security… appear nowhere in the planning documents on which the project was reviewed and approved. Indeed, they materialized, for the first time, when Defendants filed their opposition brief last week.”
In less-legal terms, Chutkan is basically noting that, as opponents of the arch have suggested for months, Trump and his cronies made up some utter flimflam about the “security” opportunities of an enormous arch in the middle of D.C. and tried to shoehorn it through legal review. Chutkan has said in no uncertain terms that that’s not going to cut it.
“The White House commends the National Capital Planning Commission’s decision to fully approve President Trump’s historic vision to build a much needed Triumphal Arch in Washington, D.C.,” White House spokesperson Davis Ingle posted after the ruling. “An activist district court thereafter blocked the construction of the project.”
The judge’s posture toward the flimsy legal work of the Trump administration mirrors that of another federal judge, Ana C. Reyes, who exploded at administration lawyers in court a few weeks back after they tried to pull a fast one on her during Trump’s renovation of the East Potomac Golf Links. Reyes’ beef with the administration was more explicit — she accused them of explicitly betraying her trust — but similar to the core of Chutkan’s argument here. In essence, the administration’s lawyers can’t be trusted, because they are making up whatever excuse they can to enact the president’s will.
Trump is, as we all know, someone who is used to getting what he wants. For his entire career, he has employed legal teams to help him accomplish those things, whether they be sweeping aside sexual assault allegations, dodging taxes, or finding ways to enrich himself from the Oval Office. Federal judges have been less amenable to this than the private courts Trump worked with as a civilian, but now, with Trump’s mandate across the government eroding by the hour, it seems unlikely any justice with a gavel is going to allow him an inch.
That won’t stop him trying, of course, as it’s very likely that building an arch or an unnecessary ballroom is the only solace he has left.
