What Trump Might Have Done to the Tidal Basin Beaver Vandals

I can only imagine how President Trump would have handled three mischievous beavers that attacked Washington, D.C.’s beloved cherry trees in 1999.

The National Cherry Blossom Festival is underway in Washington. Some 3,700 cherry trees — a gift from Japan in 1912 — are in bloom, and tourists are flocking to see them.

In 1999, however, three beavers were felling these trees faster than you could say “timber!”

Washington bureaucrats and advocacy groups responded to the crisis in their usual convoluted manner.

PETA was first out of the gate. Its spokesperson said it would be best to trap the beavers in the most humane way possible and relocate them.

No sooner was PETA’s uncharacteristically sensible idea floated than wildlife experts began crawling out of the woodwork.

One expert warned that it would be tragic to separate the beavers, since they’re likely from the same family. One beaver was a yearling, she said, and beavers should stay with mom and dad until the age of two.

Another expert said you can’t move beavers to a new colony anyway, because the new colony would reject the freeloaders.

A third expert said that all things considered, the most humane thing to do might be to just kill the buggers.

Boy, did the public react negatively to that suggestion. That’s because beavers are really cute.

Heck, if they looked more like their pointy-nosed cousins — rats — even PETA might have lined the Tidal Basin banks, firing 12-gauge buckshot without relent.

But PETA wanted nothing to do with euthanizing the furry critters. A spokesperson said they should leave the beavers alone — so what if they created a gigantic cherry tree dam.

I can only imagine how Trump would handle the situation if it happened now.

He would fire out this 3 a.m. tweet: “Beavers are DESTROYING our beautiful cherry trees — a GIFT from Japan, very historic! Evacuate within 48 hours or I’ll send in SEAL Team 6!”

He would open his subsequent press conference by boasting, “Nobody’s been tougher on beavers than me!”

“But Mr. President,” reporters would shout, “why didn’t you relocate the beavers?”

“Maybe I did, maybe I didn’t,” Trump would say. “Why would I tell a reporter?”

In any event, in 1999, after weeks of bickering, the National Park Service finally hired a professional trapper to catch the beavers and cart them off to a “safe house,” which, I believe, is a witness protection program for semiaquatic rodents.

But the experts continued bickering for weeks. Multiple D.C. types complained about the solution. Some beaver advocates accused the Park Service of fake news before that term was in vogue.

All I know is that spring has arrived in Washington, and like it or not, Trump’s aggressive approach to governing has taken a sledgehammer to the way Washington and the world have long operated.

It’s lucky for Trump critics that the great beaver invasion happened in 1999 and not during Trump’s second term.

Otherwise, tourists would be visiting the “Make Cherry Blossoms Great Again Festival.”

The Tidal Basin would be renamed “Trump’s Tremendous Waterscape — Beaver-Free!”

And three very confused rodents would be wondering how the heck they ended up in Guantánamo Bay.