Jennifer GaengFeb 18, 2026 4 min read

Ohio Sculptor's 15-Foot Gold Trump Statue Stuck in Limbo

A 15-foot-tall statue of President Trump covered in gold leaf is sitting in a Zanesville, Ohio foundry. It's not going anywhere until the people who commissioned it pay up.

Ohio sculptor Alan Cottrill completed the bronze statue in January 2025. Now it's newly gilded with gold leaf and stuck in the middle of an eight-month payment dispute with a cryptocurrency group behind $PATRIOT, a memecoin honoring Trump.

The Patriot group still owes a little more than $90,000 for the $300,000 project, Cottrill told the Times Recorder. Around $75,000 of that comes from 15 months of copyright misuse. The memecoin started using the statue as its logo when it launched on Election Day 2024, without telling Cottrill.

"I felt that they tried to take advantage of me and the statue that I made," Cottrill said. "That statue isn't leaving Zanesville until they pay."

The Original Plan

The bronze statue was commissioned in August 2024. The initial plan was a two-year tour across the U.S. visiting Republican conventions before landing at either a presidential library or the Republican National Committee headquarters.

Then the plan changed. Cottrill and his team were supposed to unveil the statue for the presidential inauguration parade in January 2025. But the Patriot group called with a message from the U.S. Secret Service. The statue's debut got derailed because subzero temperatures in Washington D.C. forced the procession into the Capital One Arena instead.

From there, the statue went into limbo for close to a year. It traveled between at least two different warehouses before Cottrill pitched the gold leaf idea to Patriot in November 2025.

The statue got brought back to Zanesville from storage in Pittsburgh. Ohio artist Brenda Councill adorned it with gold and completed it in early January 2026.

The Current Plan

The third plan, once remaining payments clear, is to install the larger-than-life statue on a nearly 4-foot base at Trump National Doral Miami. This is Trump's luxury golf resort. The base is already set up.

Cottrill is still waiting for an official unveiling date. He believes scheduling the statue's debut could help get the rest of the payment.

A smaller version of the Trump statue is already sitting on the base at Trump National Doral Miami. The 15-foot gold-leafed version is supposed to join it. Eventually.

The Copyright Problem

The Patriot cryptocurrency group used Cottrill's statue as their logo starting on Election Day 2024, but didn't ask permission. Fifteen months of copyright misuse adds up to about $75,000 of the $90,000 they still owe.

"The crypto guys are pissed at me. I'm pissed at the crypto guys. Only one of us has done what they've said they'd do, and that's me," Cottrill said. "It's the last they'll hear of me until I receive the funding."

The Cryptocurrency Angle

The Patriot coin is still tradeable according to crypto aggregator CoinGecko. But it deflated after Trump and wife Melania each released their own cryptocurrencies in 2025.

So, the people who commissioned a $300,000 gold-leafed Trump statue are running a memecoin that tanked after Trump released his own competing cryptocurrency. And now they won't pay the sculptor who made their logo.

About the Sculptor

Cottrill has sculpted more than 400 large figures across the U.S. which includes athletes and coaches like Jesse Owens and Woody Hayes, inventors like Thomas Edison, and over a dozen American presidents. He’s even created animals like bobcats on the Ohio University campus.

Many others, including a smaller Trump statue, stand outside the Alan Cottrill Sculpture Museum and Studio at 110 S. Sixth St. in Zanesville.

The Bottom Line

The statue was supposed to tour Republican conventions then get unveiled at the inauguration parade. Then it sat in warehouses for almost a year. Then it got gold-leafed. Now it's waiting for payment.

The statue isn't moving until the check clears.