this post was submitted on 20 Jul 2026
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The Trump administration’s case against the former Olympic canoeist accused of damaging the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool is about to fall apart.

Following the draining of the Reflecting Pool last week, David Hearn filed a motion to dismiss the federal indictment against him. In his motion, Hearn argued that the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia failed to preserve the physical evidence against him: the lining of the pool that he is accused of damaging.

Hearn’s attorneys said in their motion that they had made a written request for federal prosecutors to preserve the evidence, but the pool has repeatedly been drained more than once since his arrest, and large sections of the liner are missing.

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[–] PattyMcB@lemmy.world 13 points 1 day ago (1 children)

They really brought in the FBI?!

What a fucking joke

[–] Thebeardedsinglemalt@lemmy.world 10 points 1 day ago (1 children)

That screams "find whatever bs evidence you can. If you can't find it, find something to fake it" to me

[–] samus12345@sh.itjust.works 8 points 1 day ago

That's how fascists roll.

[–] Snapz@lemmy.world 5 points 1 day ago

"Yeah, but still! And probably what if?"

[–] wirebeads@lemmy.ca 168 points 3 days ago (3 children)

Did everyone forget that Donald J Trump raped children, is named as a person in the murder of a new born child and is has his name littered throughout the Epstein files?

Smoke and mirrors, but in the form of reflecting pool paint.

[–] kmartburrito@lemmy.world 45 points 2 days ago (1 children)
[–] madcaesar@lemmy.world 6 points 1 day ago

Hahaha holy shit this is good

[–] LincolnsDogFido@lemmy.zip 26 points 3 days ago (2 children)

No, but also consider that these arrests are a VERY deliberate action related to the efforts to distract from the ties between Trump and rape/pedophilia.

Legacy media's current objective is to inflate EVERY story they can, let the public ruminate on it a bit and use engagement to either push it more or let it die out. The adminstration managed to capture the broad audience with faux mystery about how the liner failed, so everyone knew and was talking about it. Then they made arrests to drag attention to innocent people being scapegoated by a fascist government. So now we're forced to choose between spending the time correcting the record so innocent people don't end up in prison and bringing the focus back on Epstein with the understanding that its very likely nothing would come of it anyway. At least one of the 2 options helps free innocent people.

To be clear. I really wish we could force media to talk about both in equal length and with equal vigor, but they're in on it. I really hate where we are right now and found myself watching the World Cup trophy presentation despite actively disliking both countries in the final just on the non-zero chance I could see the feed interrupted by his assassination.

[–] FreshParsnip@lemmy.ca 4 points 2 days ago

I didn't watch the world cup but I watched Trump's 4th of July speech in hopes he'd have a heatstroke or be hit by lightning. It was delayed a few hours due to a thunderstorm. Too bad his handlers probably talked him out of doing it in the thunderstorm

[–] taiyang@lemmy.world 9 points 3 days ago

God that ending to the world cup would have been amazing. Too bad, but I like the way you think.

[–] Akh@lemmy.world 12 points 3 days ago
[–] WesternInfidels@feddit.online 22 points 2 days ago (1 children)

If this strategy works, it will mean that Hearn escapes his bullshit charges through legal technicalities rather than through anything that looks like a functional justice system.

[–] ryathal@sh.itjust.works 23 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Those legal technicalities are the justice system. If the state was accusing him of murder by stabbing and lost the knife and cremated the body he should absolutely be released.

[–] WesternInfidels@feddit.online 9 points 2 days ago (2 children)

Okay, fair, the technicalities are part of the justice system.

What I mean is, there will be no opportunity to refute the charges, to recognize, in an official way, that the charges were baseless and corrupt. There will not be even the slimmest possibility that the people who caused him to be charged will face any consequence for their corruption.

[–] samus12345@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 day ago

The problem is the ones who would determine that are the corrupt cronies themselves.

[–] jtrek@startrek.website 1 points 1 day ago

That's pretty typical of the US justice system. You can be falsely accused of something, spend a bunch of time with lawyers and bad press, and then they can just drop it. You don't get compensated.

[–] adespoton@lemmy.ca 29 points 3 days ago (2 children)

Hey, they finally drained the swamp!

[–] postmateDumbass@lemmy.world 1 points 1 day ago (1 children)

This is not the swamp draining that the people demanded.

[–] CharlesDarwin@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

The idiots parroting "drain the swamp" on behalf of Donvict never really gave a shit about corruption anyway.

[–] Zier@fedia.io 6 points 3 days ago

It will be full in a week, and then they will drain it again.

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 11 points 2 days ago (1 children)

There was vandalism alright, vandalism performed by the ignorance of Trump and his friends.

[–] BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.today 11 points 2 days ago (1 children)

It wasn't ignorance, it was corruption. Like all Trump construction projects, this has all the hallmarks of a classic Real Estate Development Kickback Scheme - Trump's bread & butter for his entire career, along with money laundering.

[–] phutatorius@lemmy.zip 3 points 1 day ago

It's possible to be both ignorant and corrupt. Trump is.