The woman accused of vandalizing the World War II Memorial on the National Mall earlier this month, an act which drew the wrath of President Donald Trump, says she did it to “get the nation’s attention.”
Melissa Farris, 41, told the Washington Post she graffitied the memorial to protest an arrangement between her former Kentucky employer and her labor union that allowed the union to pocket $6,000 in healthcare funds that she claimed were owed her.
She told the newspaper that she was laid off in 2024 from her electrical union job helping construct an electric vehicle battery factory in Glendale, Kentucky, but never got the money allocated to her that appears on a deposit notice reviewed by the Post.
“I was robbed, and so were my friends,” she told the Post in an interview published Thursday. “I’m just trying to do the right thing.”
“Veterans fought for people, not monuments or memorials, and I honor veterans by trying to keep our liberties and life and happiness here,” she continued. “One thing everybody can agree on is everybody loves to hate on something. So, I made a big mess to get the nation’s attention.”
Farris was arrested two weeks ago after authorities alleged she live-streamed herself writing “Clean hands Dirty $” in orange spray paint on the inside of the memorial’s Atlantic Theatre Pavilion.
Dressed in large orange sunglasses and carrying a protest sign, she also allegedly poured dish soap into the fountain.
Foam in the fountain at the World War II Memorial (justice.gov)
According to the criminal complaint originally filed with the court, Farris posted a public livestream video before she defaced the World War II Memorial and stated:
I am cognitively aware and executively (sic) of the choices I am making and I am doing so to push my whistleblower case into the courtroom . . . someone has to make choices that are different and I am accountable for my actions. I am going to make these choices today and I will step foot into the courtroom and I will wait to be arrested . . . I am accountable for the things that I do and the choices that I make and our government needs to be accountable for their choices too.
On Thursday, a federal grand jury indicted Farris on one count of destruction of veterans’ memorials and one count of destruction of federal property. Both charges are felonies and each one “carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison,” the Hill reported.
“I believe now that I was extremely naïve,” she told the Post. “I thought Washington is where you go to practice democracy. It broke my heart to walk into our nation’s capital. I think that I idealized it.”
Farris was released from custody a few days after being apprehended but had to surrender her passport and stay away from the memorial.
According to her charging document, Farris’s address on her driver’s license had her residence in Elizabethtown, Kentucky, but she is originally from northern Ohio, where she now lives.
As a condition of her release, a magistrate judge also “barred her from traveling outside of the northern Ohio and eastern Michigan area,” according to the Hill.
Farris is set to appear before U.S. District Judge Trevor McFadden in Washington, DC, for a hearing on Thursday.
A few days before Farris’s arrest, President Trump launched a Truth Social post predicting D.C. vandals would be brought to justice.
He wrote:
“Our beautiful World War II Memorial was just hit by Spray Painting Vandals. THERE CAN BE NO GREATER INSULT TO THOSE AMERICAN HEROES IN WORLD WAR II. First the Reflecting Pool, now this. We are on their trail! Where do these animals come from???”
Farris has received dozens of angry messages on social media, including death threats, the Post reported. However, she continued to spout righteous indignation in the interview with the newspaper.
“I can unite a nation quicker than anybody else, apparently, because it didn’t matter what political party they were,” she told the Post. “They can still all hate me, and then I’m going to give them the truth.”
Breitbart contributor Lowell Cauffiel is the best-selling author of the Los Angeles crime novel Below the Line and nine other crime novels and nonfiction titles. See lowellcauffiel.com for more.
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