Scott LoBaido, an artist who paints American flags, is perhaps the most famous living Staten Islander. His flag paintings can be found in outdoor spaces all over Staten Island and in each of the fifty states. Most of the paintings are big; some are gigantic. A flag he painted for a gasket company in Houston, Texas, to welcome returning soldiers as their planes approach the airport, covers three and a half acres of factory roof.

LoBaido is a slim, compact man of fifty-one who drinks Martinis, smokes Marlboro Lights, and is often spattered with paint—“My second skin,” he says. He appears occasionally in the news for his acts of public disruption, such as throwing horse manure at the Brooklyn Museum when it displayed a painting of the Virgin Mary stained with elephant dung, or illegally painting an American flag on a school whose principal had discontinued the recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance. He has been arrested about a dozen times, though the charges are usually dismissed.

Last month, a large letter “T” that he had built out of insulation board and painted with a flag motif and erected on a Staten Island lawn went up in flames in the middle of the night. The police and the fire department investigated the fire as arson. A political motive was suspected. The “T” stands for Trump, among other things; LoBaido and the homeowner, Sam Pirozzolo, a local political figure and optician, both support the candidate. Trump himself called them the day after the fire to make sure Pirozzolo’s family was safe, and to tell them, “You guys on Staten Island have my back.”

At Da Noi, an Italian restaurant on Fingerboard Road, LoBaido always sits at a table by the wall under his large glass-enclosed work consisting of thirty-five hundred toy army men painted different colors and arranged to depict an American flag. The army men are all American-made, and it took him a long time to find American-made army men, he told a visitor who joined him there recently. In conversation, LoBaido effervesces like a Roman candle. “People write graffiti on my work,” he said. “It happens. So what? I paint it out. Someone wrote ‘Patriotism makes me sick’ on a flag I did in Brooklyn. I painted a rattlesnake over the writing, like the ‘Don’t tread on me’ snake. Graffiti doesn’t bother me. But I was surprised when my ‘T’ got torched. I expected some reaction to the ‘T,’ like maybe graffiti or eggs being thrown at it. But, I mean, you’re gonna burn my ‘T’? Disagree with it, sure. Yell at it, say it’s lousy art. But why would you burn it? The fire scared the hell out of Sam, the guy whose lawn it is. He lost that house to an electrical fire eight years ago. It took him three years to build it back. Why would you use violence? I never use violence. Throwing horseshit at the Brooklyn Museum is not violence. What is horseshit? Basically just wet straw.”

A white-haired man at the bar came over and told LoBaido that he wanted to shake his hand. LoBaido thanked him.

“So after the fire, of course, I rebuilt the ‘T’ bigger,” he continued. “On the phone, I even told Trump, ‘I’m gonna make it _yuuuge! _’ He got a chuckle out of that. It used to be twelve feet high by eight feet wide, and now it’s sixteen feet high by twelve feet wide. It’s beautifully lit up by spotlights, looks gorgeous at night. Security cameras, the works. Rebuild it bigger! That’s my one complaint with the Freedom Tower. It’s fine, but we should’ve rebuilt the original towers just as they were, or even bigger—like, ‘Fuck me? Uh-uh. No, no, fuck _you! _’ ”

He ordered a decaf espresso and asked the waiter to top it off with Sambuca. A smell of licorice rose. “It’s decaf because I don’t need the caffeine,” LoBaido explained. “I got so many ideas for paintings, sculptures, projects, I can never get to sleep as it is. I believe the American flag is the greatest work of art ever created by mankind, and I’m always thinking of more I can do with it. I’m a pariah in the New York art world. Just today, a guy I’ve known a long time unfriended me on Facebook for being a Trump supporter.”

Before he stepped out for a cigarette, he said, “Sometimes people tell me, ‘Scott, New York is not the place for you—you better move to a red state.’ My answer always is: No fuckin’ way. I’m a fourth-generation Staten Islander. My dad worked for the Sanitation Department for thirty-five years. New York is my city. I love the excitement and the conflict and the sexiness of it. It’s democracy, you know what I mean? I ain’t movin’ to no red state. I’m stayin’ here, and you’re just gonna have to deal with me.” ♦