Trump Banners in DC: Federal Buildings, Costs, and Hatch Act Complaint

Since May 2025, giant banners featuring President Donald Trump have appeared on federal buildings in Washington, D.C., starting at the Department of Agriculture and spreading to the Departments of Labor, Justice, and the Interior, along with construction sites around the city. A Senate report alleges the displays violate federal anti-propaganda spending laws, and an advocacy group has filed a Hatch Act complaint over related agency messaging, but as of mid-2026 no court has ordered any banner taken down and most remain in place.

Where the Banners Are and What They Show

The first banner went up at the U.S. Department of Agriculture in May 2025: a 31-foot image of Trump paired with one of Abraham Lincoln.¹ Those USDA banners have since been removed.²

Around August 2025, the Department of Labor hung a banner covering nearly three stories of its headquarters. It shows a vastly enlarged image of Trump’s face alongside the slogan “American Workers First,” with a companion banner of Theodore Roosevelt.³ A Labor Department spokesperson said the banners would stay up through the 250th anniversary of American independence, citing a “tremendous positive response.”⁴

On February 19, 2026, a large blue banner reading “Make America Safe Again” and bearing Trump’s photograph was draped between two columns on the Department of Justice headquarters on Pennsylvania Avenue.⁵ A DOJ spokeswoman said the department was “proud to celebrate 250 years of our great country and our historic work to make America safe again at President Trump’s direction.”⁶ NBC News reported that the banner itself contained no 250th-anniversary branding, just the president’s image and the slogan.

On June 24, 2026, three-story banners featuring Trump alongside George Washington appeared above the main entrance of the Department of the Interior. Each stands at least 30 feet tall and carries the slogan “America First.”²

A separate, smaller style of sign has also spread across Washington construction sites in 2026. The six-foot signs show Trump in a white hard hat against crimson scaffolding with the words “Thank you, President Trump.”⁷ They have been seen at the Columbus Circle renovation in front of Union Station, in Logan Circle, and on a construction wall on Pennsylvania Avenue across from the National Gallery of Art.³

What Taxpayers Have Spent

A September 2025 report from Senator Adam Schiff of California documented at least $50,000 in taxpayer spending on the banners across three agencies: $16,400 at USDA, roughly $6,000 at the Labor Department, and $33,726 at the Department of Health and Human Services.⁸ The HHS solicitation covered signage promoting Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s “Make America Healthy Again” campaign and specified materials durable enough to last four years, the length of a presidential term.⁹

The Interior Department has not disclosed the cost or scope of its construction-site campaign. A spokesperson said the signs are part of an effort to “recognize the President’s efforts to enhance and prepare our nation’s capital ahead of the 250th anniversary celebration,” but declined to say who authorized them, how many exist, or what they cost.⁷

Who Authorized the Banners

No single White House directive has been publicly identified. The evidence in Schiff’s investigation instead points to individual agencies acting through their political appointees. At USDA, internal emails showed that Deputy Director of Communications Alec Varsamis and Press Assistant Mason Prickett planned the installation, with Prickett making the “final decision on the timing.”⁹ At the Labor Department, then-Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer personally promoted the display, telling Trump at a Cabinet meeting: “I invite you to see your big, beautiful face on a banner in front of the Department of Labor because you are really the transformational president of the American worker.”³ At HHS, the signage contract was issued on behalf of the “Office of the Secretary.” The White House declined to comment on the banners’ cost, duration, or reasoning, referring questions to individual departments.¹⁰

The Legal Case Against the Banners

Schiff’s report, titled “Propaganda: How the Trump Administration Is Breaking the Law and Wasting Taxpayer Dollars With Giant Banners of Donald Trump,” argues the displays violate longstanding federal statutes that prohibit spending appropriated funds on “publicity or propaganda” not authorized by Congress. It cites provisions of Public Law 118-47 (as extended by Public Law 119-4) that bar agencies from using funds for propaganda, together with department-specific restrictions on the Labor Department.⁹

The report leans on Government Accountability Office and DOJ Office of Legal Counsel guidance distinguishing legitimate agency information from prohibited spending that tends to “extol and exploit the virtues of a department” or its officials. The banners, Schiff argues, convey no agency information and exist solely to aggrandize the president.⁹

Republicans have countered that the criticism is selective. Representative Barry Loudermilk of Georgia pointed out that the Biden administration had encouraged agencies to post signage crediting President Biden for infrastructure projects, and Senator Joni Ernst of Iowa had raised similar objections to Biden-era signage in a 2024 letter to the White House Office of Management and Budget.⁸

An HHS spokesperson said the agency’s solicitations undergo a “full legal and compliance review to ensure they meet federal requirements.” White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson dismissed Schiff’s report.⁴ No formal investigation by the GAO or an inspector general into the banner spending has been publicly reported.

The Hatch Act Complaint

In October 2025, the advocacy group Public Citizen filed a Hatch Act complaint with the Office of Special Counsel targeting political messaging on the websites of the Small Business Administration and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Ethics experts quoted at the time doubted the messages violated the Hatch Act because they did not reference an election. The complaint’s prospects were further dimmed by the fact that the Trump administration had fired the previous head of the Office of Special Counsel and nominated an ally to lead it.¹¹

Related Renamings the Courts Have Reached

Courts have not been asked to remove the banners themselves, but they have intervened in adjacent efforts to place Trump’s name on Washington landmarks. A Trump-appointed board of trustees voted to rename the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts the “Trump Kennedy Center.” U.S. District Judge Christopher R. Cooper struck down the renaming in a 94-page opinion, holding that “Congress gave the Kennedy Center its name, and only Congress can change it,” and citing the 1964 law that created the institution as a memorial to President Kennedy.¹² Judge Cooper ordered the 18 letters removed from the portico within two weeks and denied a stay, finding no likelihood of success on appeal.¹³ The D.C. Circuit denied an emergency stay, and workers began putting up scaffolding in mid-June 2026.¹⁴

The administration also renamed the U.S. Institute of Peace the “Donald J. Trump Institute of Peace” in December 2025, after the State Department took control of the building through the Department of Government Efficiency. A federal district court ruled the underlying government seizure illegal in May 2025, but that ruling was stayed on appeal, and a final decision is pending.¹⁵

What’s Up Now

As of mid-2026, the banners at the Department of Justice, the Department of Labor, and the Department of the Interior remain in place. The USDA banners have been removed. No court order requires any of the remaining banners to come down, and the administration has given no indication that it intends to take them down before the 250th anniversary observance.²

1
The Atlantic. Trump’s Face Is All Over Washington
2
Forbes. Giant Trump Washington Banners Appear at Department of Interior
3
News From the States. Iconic Landmarks, Federal Buildings in DC Increasingly Show Fealty to Trump
4
Axios. Trump Face Banners on Federal Buildings Cost Taxpayer Money
5
NBC News. Banner of President Donald Trump Displayed at DOJ Headquarters
6
PBS NewsHour. Trump’s Face Is Now on the Justice Department Headquarters
7
The Independent. Trump Banners at Construction Sites in DC
8
CNN. Trump Banners Schiff Report
9
Senator Adam Schiff. Propaganda: How the Trump Administration Is Breaking the Law and Wasting Taxpayer Dollars With Giant Banners of Donald Trump
10
New York Times. Trump Banner at DOJ
11
The Hill. Government Agencies Violate Hatch Act
12
New York Times. Kennedy Center Trump Name Remove
13
Axios. Trump Kennedy Center Name Removal
14
NPR. A Judge Clears the Way for Trump’s Name to Be Removed From the Kennedy Center
15
NPR. Trump Institute of Peace Name