WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump on Thursday went on an unannounced trip to the Lincoln Memorial to see the Reflecting Pool after he had it coated in a color he calls “American flag blue.”
He did more than just see it — the Republican president was driven across the new coating before he got out of his SUV to make a statement and answer questions from reporters who had been taken there to await his arrival before the sun set.
The new blue coating will hide the pool's gray stone, a color Trump said was “never good.” The project cost nearly $2 million, he said.
“It never had the color people wanted, but now it’s going to have the great color,” he said, standing in the pool surrounded by some of his Cabinet secretaries, including Doug Burgum of Interior and Markwayne Mullin of Homeland Security.
Trump had similar feelings about the gray granite exterior of the Eisenhower Executive Office Building next to the White House, describing it as a “really bad color” last year. The president wants to cover the building in white paint and two federal agencies are reviewing his proposal.
Trump said he is also working on the memorial to President Abraham Lincoln itself, but he offered no specifics, saying only that “we have a beautiful plan” in mind.
Work has been underway at the memorial for the past few years on an underground visitors’ center scheduled to open in June.
Trump last month announced the reflecting pool renovation during an unrelated Oval Office appearance. He said he was inspired by the complaints of a friend visiting from Germany, who he said told him the water in the pool was dark, filthy, and looked disgusting.
The project is another way for Trump to leave his mark on the city, following his demolition of the White House East Wing to build a large ballroom there.
Critics have said Trump is spending too much time and attention on his pet projects and not enough on issues that voters care about, like the cost of living, in the run-up to the November elections. Others have said he wants the reflecting pool to look more like an actual swimming pool.
Trump lashed out when a reporter asked why he was focused on the Reflecting Pool, given U.S. military action in Iran. He said several truckloads of garbage had been hauled away after it was removed from the pool and said, “Our country is about beauty, cleanliness, safety, great people. Not a filthy capital.”
“We're fixing up the reflecting pond to the Lincoln Memorial, the Washington Monument and you say, ‘Why are you fixing it up?’" Trump continued. “Because you can understand dirt maybe better than I can, but I don't allow it.”
President Donald Trump arrives to visit the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool to see the new blue protective coating being applied as part of a renovation project, Thursday, May 7, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)
President Donald Trump arrives to visit the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool to see the new blue protective coating being applied as part of a renovation project, Thursday, May 7, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)
President Donald Trump speaks as he visits the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool to see the new blue protective coating being applied as part of a renovation project, Thursday, May 7, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)
BOULDER, Colo. (AP) — A judge sentenced a man to life in prison without the possibility of parole Thursday after he pleaded guilty to killing one person and injuring a dozen others in a 2025 firebombing attack on a demonstration in Boulder, Colorado, in support of Israeli hostages in Gaza.
Speaking to the court through an interpreter, Mohamed Sabry Soliman apologized to the victims and expressed regret for the attack last June as not in line with Islamic teaching.
Yet Soliman, an Egyptian national who federal authorities say was living in the U.S. illegally, targeted the victims because they were Jewish, Boulder County District Judge Nancy Salomone pointed out before sentencing him.
“You chose a time and a place and a set of circumstances and weapons that were designed to inflict the most pain that you could,” Salomone said.
Besides life in prison, Soliman's sentence includes hundreds of years for dozens of charges including attempted murder, assault and attempted assault.
The June 1 attack rattled Boulder, a scenic city of 100,000 people near the mountains northwest of Denver.
Posing as a gardener, Soliman attacked the demonstrators on Pearl Street, a quaint downtown pedestrian mall lined with shops and restaurants. Jewish community members had been demonstrating there weekly in support of Israeli hostages held in the Gaza Strip since Oct. 7, 2023.
Yelling “Free Palestine," Soliman lit and threw two Molotov cocktails out of 18 he'd brought in a box. The bursting bottles filled with gasoline badly burned Karen Diamond, 82, and injured a dozen others.
Diamond died three weeks later after what her sons in a statement called “indescribable pain.”
Soliman still faces federal hate crimes charges. He has pleaded not guilty while prosecutors in that case weigh whether to seek the death penalty.
The attack could have been even worse, Boulder County District Attorney Michael Dougherty told the court before the sentencing. Soliman tried twice to buy a gun and was denied, Dougherty said. So he “decided to set them on fire" in what Dougherty called a “cowardly” crime.
Soliman entered the U.S. in August 2022 on a tourist visa that expired in February 2023. He filed for asylum and was granted a work authorization in March 2023, but that also expired, federal authorities said.
He worked a series of low-paying jobs. At the time of the attack, Soliman was living with his wife and their five children in an apartment in Colorado Springs.
Federal authorities alleged Soliman planned the attack for a year, and an FBI affidavit said Soliman told police after his arrest that he sought "to kill all Zionist people," a reference to the movement to establish and protect a Jewish state in Israel.
Soliman said in court that he respected Jewish people he has known, but questioned the deaths of innocent people in Israeli attacks on Gaza.
“Yes, I am against Israel and I can’t deny that. And that is my right,” Soliman said.
Soliman’s federal defense lawyers argue he should not have been charged with hate crimes because he was motivated by opposition to Zionism. An attack motivated by someone’s political views is not considered a hate crime under federal law.
State prosecutors identified 29 victims in the attack. Thirteen were physically injured. The others were considered victims because they could have been hurt. A dog was also injured in the attack, and Soliman was charged with animal cruelty.
Soliman’s wife, Hayam El Gamal, and their children spent 10 months in immigration detention until April, when a federal judge in Texas ordered their release. The couple divorced in April.
An immigration appeals court had dismissed their case to stay in the U.S. and issued a deportation order. But U.S. District Judge Fred Biery in San Antonio allowed their release on the condition that El Gamal and her oldest child, who is 18, wear electronic monitoring.
Soliman’s attorneys seek to block the family’s deportation until a judge determines they won’t need to be present for court proceedings in his federal case.
Associated Press writer Jacques Billeaud in Phoenix contributed to this story.
A law enforcement vehicle is parked outside of the Boulder County Justice Center in Boulder, Colo., on Thursday, May 7, 2026. (AP Photo/Thomas Peipert)
Boulder County District Attorney Michael Dougherty speaks at a news conference in Boulder, Colo., on Thursday, May 7, 2026, following the sentencing of a man charged in a firebombing attack in the city in 2025. (AP Photo/Thomas Peipert)
Rachelle Halpern, who witnessed a firebombing attack in 2025, attends a news conference following the suspect's sentencing in Boulder, Colo., on Thursday, May 7, 2026. (AP Photo/Thomas Peipert)
FILE - Law enforcement officials investigate after an attack on the Pearl Street Mall, June 1, 2025, in Boulder, Colo. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski, file)
FILE - Bouquets of flowers stand along a makeshift memorial for victims of an attack outside of the Boulder County courthouse on June 3, 2025, in Boulder, Colo. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski, file)
