Last week, the project won approval from the National Capital Planning Commission. But U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan ruled that there should be a 14-day pause before any work on the arch can begin while the litigation plays out. The Kennedy family filed their complaint under a joint lawsuit filed by the state of Virginia and Washington, D.C., that seeks to block construction, arguing that the arch will damage “historically significant sight lines” if it is erected at the entrance to the cemetery. The plaintiffs include seven children of Robert and Ethel Kennedy, as well as their grandson, former Democratic congressman Joe Kennedy, and Ted Kennedy’s son, Edward Kennedy Jr. They do not include Trump Cabinet official Robert F. Kennedy Jr, who heads the Department of Health and Human Services. Their motion seeks to intervene in two other lawsuits filed by conservationists and veterans seeking to stop construction. They say the arch would be a “permanent denigration” of the graves and that Kennedy’s descendants would “never again be able to appreciate both sites as they always have before and as the Kennedy family always wanted.”
