The debate over Donald Trump’s proposed “triumphal” arch took a weird turn last month when the president argued, in apparent seriousness, that the monument could serve a national security purpose. This week, two prominent members of the White House Cabinet apparently decided it was time to play along. The Washington Post reported: Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin detailed the arch’s potential security features as part of legal filings that the administration submitted ahead of a hearing on Friday.

Both officials said Washington faces “continuously evolving” threats and that Trump’s planned 250-foot-tall arch — positioned by the south end of the Arlington Memorial Bridge — would offer a perch to coordinate officials’ security response, deploy snipers and take other steps to defend the region.

“The Arch is a generational national defense opportunity to mitigate these evolving threats,” Hegseth said in his declaration. “It will be utilized as a dual-purpose structure: a major national monument that also incorporates military utility to support Homeland defense.”

This is all rather silly. In a planning document released last month, the National Park Service conceded the “triumphal arch” that Trump is so desperate to build would cause “adverse effects” to nearby historic properties and monuments if construction advances as planned. But, the administration added, the (wildly unnecessary and legally dubious) project would move forward anyway.

A week later, the campaign to build one of the president’s many vanity projects took a rather farcical turn when Trump said that he planned to convert the 250-foot project into a “top grade military complex” to house drones. In case that wasn’t quite laughable enough, the Republican — who claimed to be acting in response to a “strong request” from unnamed Armed Forces personnel — added that the arch would also feature snipers on the roof, along with “large quantities of sniper ammunition in storage.”

Democratic Rep. Don Beyer of Virginia, whose congressional district includes the area in question, called the president’s argument “stupid” and “idiotic,” adding, “Trump clearly expects to lose a lawsuit and therefore wants to set up a pretext to argue that the arch is tied to national security.”And therein lay the point. When Trump was worried about the litigation surrounding the White House ballroom vanity project, he shifted his rhetorical focus to argue the project had a national security component.

It did not, but someone apparently explained to him that federal courts have traditionally given presidents wide latitude to pursue national security priorities. That it appeared to work with the ballroom seems to have given him the idea of trying to pull the same trick twice.

Two weeks ago, the administration released revised plans for the arch project — which did not include features related to the military — although the White House indicated it would still pursue Trump’s stated goals. The declarations from Hegseth and Mullin were part of that effort.

Meanwhile, as a group of U.S. military veterans move forward with legal efforts to prevent work on the project, the head of the Vietnam Veterans of America said this week that his organization had endorsed construction of the arch based on “inaccurate information” he’d received.

A separate Washington Post analysis found that Trump’s giant project, if constructed, would literally cast a shadow over the John F. Kennedy Memorial, the Military Women’s Memorial and tens of thousands of graves at Arlington National Cemetery, depending on the season and time of day.

Asked about those findings, a White House spokesperson said the 250-foot structure would “enhance the visitor experience” at the cemetery. As someone who’s been Arlington National Cemetery several times, I have no idea what that means.