The government shutdown has entered its 33rd day. If it’s still going by Thursday, it will be the new record-holder, dethroning the 35-day shutdown that began in December 2018… also under a Trump term sentence. November 1 was a pivotal marker, as not only did the shutdown cross into its second month, but that was also the deadline for SNAP benefits to run out. Two federal judges have ordered the administration to dip into emergency funds, which Trump responded to (on social media) with the strange argument that his administration didn’t have “the legal authority” to do so. I’m sure judges just love being corrected on legal matters by this convicted felon. But the salient point is that this is a vulnerable, stressful moment for millions of Americans in an already struggling economy, but we can take comfort in knowing the president has been busy… throwing a Great Gatsby-themed Halloween party and unveiling the floor-to-ceiling marble renovation of the Lincoln bathroom. Obviously, there’s been outrage. Marble, not GOLD, for the Lincoln bathroom?! Don’t worry, all the hardware and accents are in gold.
President Donald Trump isn’t just remaking the East Wing of the White House. On Friday, he showed off an entirely renovated Lincoln Bathroom — white marble with gold accents — on his social media platform.
“I renovated the Lincoln Bathroom in the White House,” Trump wrote on Truth Social alongside photos of the before and after. “It was renovated in the 1940s in an art deco green tile style, which was totally inappropriate for the Lincoln Era.”
He continued, “I did it in black and white polished Statuary marble. This was very appropriate for the time of Abraham Lincoln and, in fact, could be the marble that was originally there!”
Trump generated controversy this month by tearing down the White House’s East Wing as part of the construction project to build his new 90,000-square-foot, $300 million ballroom. The cost is being covered by private donors.
However, most Americans oppose the demolition to make way for Trump’s ballroom, according to an ABC News/Washington Post/Ipsos poll conducted using Ipsos’ KnowledgePanel.
A 56% majority of Americans oppose the decision, including 45% who “strongly” oppose it, the poll found. Just 28% of Americans support it, with 15% strongly supporting the East Wing being torn down for a ballroom, the poll found.
Trump criticized Harry Truman’s redesign of the Lincoln Bedroom, including the bathroom, earlier this month when he first revealed he was redoing the room.
“It’s a style that is not good. … It is actually art deco and art deco doesn’t go with 1850 and civil wars,” Trump said at the time.
Truman redid the room in 1945, shortly after taking over the presidency from Franklin D. Roosevelt, redesigning it primarily in blue.
Forgive me, I’ve never been on a White House tour, but just because a room is named for a particular president, that doesn’t mean the whole decor of the room is in tribute to that president, right? The White House isn’t the Madonna Inn, where each room has its own camp-tacular theme. The Lincoln bathroom doesn’t have to be “1850 and civil wars.” Which, by the way, marble + gold do not represent, either. But of course the bigger issue is that we’re saddled with a president who’s bulldozing over our history (literally and symbolically) with virtually no oversight. Trump is clearly more engaged with his reno projects (SNL got him good this weekend with their HGTV sketch) and AI-generated videos; why did he even bother running for president again? I know why, but still. I can’t help thinking that we could have averted this whole disaster by setting up Dementia Don with special glasses in some AI-assisted virtual reality room where he could renovate and play president to his heart’s content (or whatever occupies that space), while we get to keep our republic. Instead we have a serial suntan-lotion abuser spending Halloween weekend gleefully showing off opulent interior design as millions of citizens wonder how they’re gonna buy food. The echoes of Marie Antoinette are as glaringly apparent as Trump’s tacky gold decor, except he’s probably too uneducated to get the reference. Let ‘em eat candy.
