This is not a shrine celebrating a self-centered egomaniac. Not another self-aggrandizing building plastered with the President’s name.
Public and private funding for this Presidential Library will not be spent on labor, materials and resources to construct a building that celebrates the digressive and dangerous decisions that have been made under the administration of the 45th President.
Instead, all funding will be redirected and dispersed to the American people and their communities; specifically communities that have experienced severe pain and suffering as a result of the COVID-19 crisis—a crisis amplified by the President’s lack of compassion and ability to think beyond himself. Not coincidentally, these communities have been ignored and underserved by the federal government for far too long.
This Library 45—Gardens of Loss, Life and Love—is a decentralized network of gardens, groves and forests distributed across the country, attuned to local ecologies and designed to flourish into the future. Beginning in American communities with the highest COVID-19 death rates, family members who lost loved ones are invited to select a unique native species to plant in designated public spaces. Over time these gardens will blossom and bloom, providing fertile grounds for all forms of life to gather and grow.
This act of honoring loss, life and love will result in a series of biodiverse ecosystems across America—made by and for the people—that will simultaneously reflect on the past and radiate into the future.