Every aspect of Donald Trump’s Reflecting Pool renovation project has become embarrassing. On cue, the president has responded to the ongoing fiasco in predictable fashion, concocting strange tales that free him of any responsibility for his failure.

The trouble is, the more he hedges on the details, the more it seems that he’s just clumsily making stuff up.

The basics of the Republican’s problem are obvious: The Reflecting Pool is too green, it has cost too much, it has taken too long, and its new blue paint is peeling. Taken together, the fiasco is shattering Trump’s myth that his approach to problem-solving — cutting corners, controversial no-bid contracts, rushed timelines, etc. — is somehow superior to his predecessors’.

With this in mind, the president began assuring the public in recent days that he had succeeded beautifully, until “vandals” intervened and ruined his triumph. It’s these awful villains, he insisted, who deserve the blame.

Trump just hasn’t worked out the details.

He’s not sure what happened: Trump alleged that nefarious criminals somehow caused the blue peeling, “probably” using “a box cutter or a knife of some kind.” The president’s choice of words suggested that he didn’t really know what happened and was really just speculating based on personal hunches about possible excuses.

He’s not sure about the size of the “gash” in the pool’s coating: Though Trump recently boasted that the bottom of the pool would be impervious to damage from blades, he said Saturday that unnamed and unidentified criminals were responsible for a 250-foot long-gash. Two days later, he said it was 300 feet, and by Tuesday, it was 350 feet. Whether any such “gash” exists at all remains unclear, but the president’s evolving narrative makes the tale that much more absurd.

He’s not sure where the evidence is: When reporters asked the president to substantiate his odd claims with evidence, he offered none but said to call the Interior Department. Told the next day that the department hadn’t shared any evidence when asked, Trump changed the subject.

He’s not sure when the mysterious sabotage happened: The president said the Reflecting Pool was attacked “probably in the dark of night.”

He’s not sure how many have been charged: After saying five people have been arrested, Trump told reporters, “They’ve arrested, I think, six people.” (Without more information, it’s nearly impossible to say whether these people actually did anything wrong or whether they were charged as part of an inherently political exercise.)

The more the president hedges on every relevant detail, the more his dubious story becomes literally unbelievable.

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