A National Park Service employee revealed on Monday that the administration lied when it claimed it had to remove hundreds of “falling, dangerous, disease-infested trees” at East Potomac Park’s golf course.
During the hearing before Judge Ana Reyes, Dr. Kevin Griess, the superintendent of National Mall and Memorial Parks, was asked about who made the decision to remove the trees. After some back and forth where Griess denied responsibility, he did say that he made the decision along with one other person.
“Two parts. First one is myself, developed by my staff under my direction. Then approved to move forward for implementation, done by my Washington Office. Jessica Bowron” was the other. However, Griess said that the project could not go forward without Bowron.
Lawfare senior editor Molly Roberts, who was present for the court proceedings, along with Roger Parloff, recalled that Bowron testified to the opposite.
“Pull up Trump’s post from yesterday morning. It says the course is in poor condition with falling diseased, dangerous trees. I thought you’d testified that diseased, dangerous trees had already been removed. That was May/Sept. removal. Correct?” the judge asked Griess.
She continued, “Currently on ground as of Oct. 5 was golf course overrun with falling, dangerous, disease-infested trees?”
Griess said there was an area called “Trash Island” that was about 21,000 sq. yards that they weren’t able to access until they were inside the gates. There could have been some dangerous trees in that area.
“Okay, so, there might be one or two, but most were healthy?” the judge asked.
“Yes,” Griess agreed.
The judge pointed out that there were hundreds of trees that were healthy, non-invasive that were chopped down.
She asked, “as of Friday, Oct. 9, were there, in general, falling, dangerous and disease-infested trees on the course?”
“Not to my knowledge. May have been a few, like I said,” Griess said.
“Always gonna be a couple of bad trees in a forest, right?” the judge said. “To your knowledge, are there dangerous, disease-infested trees now?” She said that, based on what he was saying, it seemed that there might be one or two, but that’s not what they’re dealing with on the course.
Griess agreed with that assessment.
This directly contradicts President Donald Trump’s claims about the trees and the Department of Interior’s claim that the trees needed to be removed because they were unstable or diseased.
Griess at one point addressed the importance of the 1920s plan they designed and sought to implement. This is different from the design that the president uploaded and doesn’t include the competition-style PGA course.
Judge Reyes wanted to sort through how old the trees were, and Griess said he didn’t know. She asked if some of them were there before the 1920s and Griess said that it was possible. That would mean that they existed even before the 1920s plan was drawn up.
Last week, Reyes issued a temporary restraining order pausing any further work on the course. Trump’s Truth Social posts over the weekend and Monday morning left plaintiffs wondering whether the court orders were being ignored. So they returned to court on Monday to discuss.
On Sunday, the Trump administration tried to have the judge removed after she reportedly yelled in court. They claimed she was too overly emotional to oversee the case. She refused to step down and issued the ruling overnight.