Trump’s triumphal arch has new enemies – the Kennedys

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The president’s plan for a near 80-metre monument in Washington is attracting the legal wrath of America’s most prominent political family.

Washington: President Donald Trump’s planned 76-metre triumphal arch has come under legal fire on multiple fronts: from veterans, a historian and the governments of the District of Columbia, Virginia and Arlington County.

Arguing that the arch, with its golden angels and flame on top, would cast a shadow on their relatives’ graves in Arlington National Cemetery, nine members of the Kennedy family moved to join existing litigation in Washington on Tuesday seeking to block the project.

They also say the arch would obstruct the intended sight line from the eternal flame at president John F. Kennedy’s gravesite, “destroying an essential element of the gravesite’s design.”

A judge in another case has temporarily paused construction of the arch – one of Trump’s favourite projects. If allowed to proceed, it would rise between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington National Cemetery. The filing claims that the placement would obstruct “a line of sight that was designed to represent the unification of the nation following the Civil War and that has existed for nearly a century”.

The arch “will permanently cast a shadow over plaintiffs’ parents’ graves and the graves of servicemen and -women who made the ultimate sacrifice for this country,” the filing added.

The plaintiffs are children or grandchildren of senators Robert F. Kennedy and Edward M. Kennedy, the former president’s brothers, who are buried near him.

“A towering arch casting shadows across the graves of our father, mother and uncles, as well as the graves of so many who have served our country, would also cast a shadow over our democratic principles, undermining the safeguards established by our elected representatives to protect this hallowed ground for generations to come,” two of the plaintiffs, Rory Kennedy and Maxwell Kennedy, who are children of Robert Kennedy and Ethel Kennedy, said in a statement.

Trump’s project has received mixed news recently. On Thursday, the National Capital Planning Commission, led by the…

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