Arizona Senator Ruben Gallego sat across from CNN's Jake Tapper this week and was asked a straightforward question: would he advocate for tearing down the White House Ballroom and the Triumphal Arch that President Trump is building on Columbia Island, near Arlington National Cemetery?
His answer wasn't no.
"I think I'd be advocating for almost all of that," Gallego told Tapper. Then he kept going. Way past the point where a normal politician's survival instincts would have kicked in.
"We need to be taking down all these, you know, honorific situations or emblems of him," Gallego said, referring to Trump. Then came the line that should follow him for the rest of his career: the next Democratic president needs to "make sure that we wipe him out."
Wipe him out. That's a sitting United States Senator talking about a twice-elected president on national television. Not "revisit the projects." Not "reassess the spending." Wipe him out.
https://rumble.com/v7fgh1o-ruben-gallego-says-next-democratic-president-should-tear-down-trumps-ballro.html
The Triumphal Arch project on Columbia Island — situated between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington National Cemetery along the Potomac River — was announced on September 3, 2026 by Interior Secretary Doug Burgum. The project had been discussed for over 125 years before Trump greenlit it. The White House Ballroom is a separate construction project. Both are now on Gallego's demolition wish list, as reported by The Gateway Pundit's Jordan Conradson.
Gallego's justification was predictable enough. "You know, the real stain that this president has put on this country has been the fact that he eroded democracy," he told Tapper. A senator who wants to bulldoze monuments built by the guy 77 million people voted for — twice — is apparently the democracy defender in this scenario.
He wasn't done. "This man has done nothing but actually destroy the very fundamental things that these men and women have fought for," Gallego said, invoking the troops buried in nearby Section 60 at Arlington National Cemetery to justify tearing down a memorial arch honoring military triumphs.
Read that quote again slowly. Gallego is standing next to hallowed ground where American servicemembers are buried and arguing that a monument to military victory dishonors them. The Triumphal Arch — a structure designed to honor the armed forces — somehow insults the military because of who authorized it. The memorial isn't the problem. The name on the executive order is.
This is the same Ruben Gallego who campaigned as a moderate to win Arizona in 2024. A Marine veteran who ran on common sense and bipartisanship. The guy who distanced himself from the progressive wing just long enough to get through Election Day. Now he's on CNN calling for the next Democratic president to conduct a purge of public works projects based on who built them.
The Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool restoration is also part of the broader improvement plan for the National Mall. No word yet on whether that makes the list, too, since Trump's fingerprints are on the funding.
Tapper, to his marginal credit, at least asked the question directly. But the follow-up that never came would have been more interesting: Senator, you represent a state Trump won. You're calling for the demolition of publicly funded monuments. How do you square "eroding democracy" with promising to tear down what a democratic election produced?
Gallego chose the word "wipe." Not reverse. Not reconsider. Wipe. The language of erasure, applied to a president whose policies half the country supports, by a senator who needed those same voters to win his seat.
That's not opposition. That's a campaign promise for a country that doesn't exist yet.