150 Comments
User's avatar
Robbie Roberts's avatar

Sent to my senator and to Senator Thune:

Senator,

Saw some renovation pictures from the White House just now. I was disappointed. Did you approve the work? And by that I mean you all in Congress? If I started to renovate my house without the proper approvals, I would be shut down. Are you guys going to shut this down or are you just going to let Donald Trump continue to tear down the People's House as he tears down our republic, piece by piece, in favor of a two-bit, bitcoin grift, a fool's-gold-plated monarchy of faux fighter plane shit?

What the actual hell? Are any of you -- our elected representatives -- doing anything for your constituents or are you just standing down, shutting down and surrendering? The answer seems evident from out here, but please tell me what's going on up there.

Sincerely,

mary M keymer's avatar

Thank You Robbie Roberts .. It should be sent to every Senator and Congressman..

Christine's avatar

Both my Senators are Democrats. One is up for re-election. But I think I will send it to them as well.

If the Senate Democrats are indeed in Washington, then they should be outside the East Wing of the White House protesting the destruction of "MY HOUSE". The arrogance and pure disrespect for the sanctity of the White House knows no limits.

And Republicans know it and choose to do nothing.

Claire from Arlington VA's avatar

Do it, Christine! Both of my VA senators and Dems, as is my Congressman. I have postcards that say on the front "WE FOUGHT FOR YOU, NOW FIGHT FOR US!" You can use that in your letter!

Robin D's avatar

Robbie, good for you. Should include a color copy of Edvar Munch's "The Scream" to drive it home!

CE's avatar

I copied and pasted it to my (democratic) elected folks. I would like to see action, something between the mute acceptance they’ve displayed thus far AND throwing their bodies in front of the machinery to stop the demolition. They need to SAY SOMETHING and DO SOMETHING.

Claire from Arlington VA's avatar

Well done and thank you, Robbie. I will use it to send to my two Dem Senators from VA (Kaine and Warner) and to my Dem Congressman.

Maui Wahine's avatar

I wrote my two Democratic senators (slightly modified your template). Of course with the government shutdown the websites say they canʻt respond right away. Hopefully the staff is still monitoring the email.

MM Harris's avatar

He's angry that employees "leaked" photos of the destruction. "Leaked"?? Like nobody would "notice" all that in broad daylight??? It hurts my soul. Yes, everything has to be returned to its original, as much as possible.

Johan's avatar

The gilded ballroom isn’t just architectural vandalism, it’s behavioral theater. A monument to corporate capture, state nihilism, and the aesthetic of impunity. When oversight is bypassed, and billionaires bankroll defacement, we’re not witnessing governance. We’re witnessing regime branding.

This isn’t a renovation. It’s a ritual, one that desecrates public trust while laundering private power. The fact that it’s ugly is almost beside the point.

The grotesque is the point.

—Johan

Robert Orsi's avatar

Yes, you're right: the sight of the destruction is itself part of the point being made. They are performing for us the reality that whatever they decide to destroy, they will destroy. It's devastating to see that. It's an act of political vandalism, a desecration.

Robin D's avatar

"The grotesque is the point". With every post of yours I look for the " nuggets". This one was it! 🙏

James Coyle's avatar

Agree completely. Michael Cohen just made the same point about regime branding.

rontier30's avatar

As you so aloquently write, this thing has to be demolished ASAP. Your description of this event is spot on. The silence of the Republicans in public office certifies the GOP should be disbanded.

Whatistobedone's avatar

Yes. The GOP... The Guardians of the Pedophiles party. Alas, a hard core will never surrender.

Fred's avatar

Again, Trump finds a way around any rules/regulations/etc to renovate the White House. He’s totally out of control and the Republican Congress continues to let him get away with anything he wants to do. What a bunch of traitors. Abrogating their oath to defend the constitution which they violate every day. He may not be a king but he’s certainly a dictator.

Joan Eisenstodt's avatar

He didn’t “find a way around”; he ignored protocols. Other people’s rules or laws mean nothing to him.

James Coyle's avatar

He doesn't need a way around them. He just defies them and dares anyone to stop him. Because the Supine Six have his back whatever he does.

M3333's avatar

The Orange Monster lies every time he opens his fat pie hole and taking out the East wing of the White House is just the latest in his over 50,000 (?) lies! I remember visiting the White House with my new wife in the summer of 1988 and exiting the White House on its north side where they had stripped all of the paint off a large window which had a black scorch mark from the British torching the White House in the War of 1812! I still have that picture of the people’s house NOT the home of the worst POtuS in American history!!!

Anthony j. Santo's avatar

When will everyday Trump enthusiasts come to understand they are being used by Trump and his grifter colleagues? The ballroom is an in-your-face monument to the oligarchical tyranny Trump and his revolting billionaire allies are building. Do Magats really believe thieves like Musk, Bezos, and Zuckerberger value them as anything more than "things" to exploit?

John D.'s avatar

I do pray that restoration occurs in my lifetime. I still find myself troubled by the large number of people around me in the South who live and breathe MAGA.

Whatistobedone's avatar

Hear you loud and clear, brother...👍

Betty Moyers's avatar

I am beyond livid. This administration has to go. They have no idea what they are doing and Congress needs to act now! So next I guess we’ll have a stripper pole coming down from the ceiling along with a disco ball. It just all makes me sick to my stomach. I hope the idiots who voted for this scumbag are waking up!

Rodney 'Butch' Bailey's avatar

They only wake up when one of his vicious actions hurts them.

Betty Moyers's avatar

Won’t be long if it hasn’t already.

Robin D's avatar

OMG Betty. I know you are serious but 😂 about the stripper pole and disco ball. He's taking the East Wing but he has to leave the stripper pole so Melania has something to do. I swear this is like "The Sopranos".

Betty Moyers's avatar

Exactly! That’s why he took the East Wing. First Ladies aren’t important …they don’t need to work. Women belong in the kitchen, bedroom and on stripper polls!

Robin D's avatar

Well, I can guarantee you the kitchen was not Melania's best room! 😉

Robin D's avatar

I am sick about so many things with this "immoral degenerate" (I love this phrase so much Steve, please let me steal it) but THIS disgusting travesty I have no words for. I knew he never had any intention of leaving with the first glint of gold. No "lame-duck" (would be happier if he was a dead duck) President gilds and builds! He has turned the WH into Versailles. I have been to many European palaces. I have been to St. Petersberg, Russia and saw the magnificent palaces and churches and The Hermitage and priceless art and the now tombs of Tsar Nicholas and his family after they found their bones and Catherine the Great next to (or was she buried on top of) her despised husband at St.Peter Paul Fortress. All this wealth and majesty built on the back of poor serfs/slaves. When you see these things in person, you understand why there were revolutions.

Seeing this desecration brought me to tears and filled me such anger.. HOW DARE HE!!! His MAGA congress and Moses Mike GRINDR Johnson sit and laugh and wait for an invite. His cavalcade of criminals in his cabinet. His Eva Braun/Evita Peron/Marie Antoinette/Slovenian hooker of a wife. The billionaires and corporations and dark money that have "donated" (probably shaken down) to build this revolting, disgusting NEEDLESS eyesore. He thinks he is invincible and living forever. I heard one of your videos where you said you often think of, or relate to, many things to films you have seen. I do too. I have also been to Mar-a-Lago with the threadbare furniture and musty smell. You know what movie I think of when I think of him? "Sunset Blvd". A washed up actress living in the past in her old decrepit mansion. He is Norma(n) Desmond. May they bury him there as his tomb.

They will have to not only tear down everything he has ever built there, remove every trace of gold, it will take years to fumigate and restore " our" house after the STENCH of him has left.

Bob Johnson's avatar

Pimp is building a whorehouse....wonder if we will have a piano player

M3333's avatar

Remember that the Orange Monster’s Daddy was a KKK and possibly with his son the greatest tax cheat in American history! His grandfather was a draft dodger in Germany and a pimp when he came to America!!!

Whatistobedone's avatar

How did Melanoma REALLY enter the States? "Modeling," I hear.

Robin D's avatar

She got an "Epstein" visa. Jeffrey Epstein said the first time Donnie Darko did it with Melania, was on his plane. And that JE did her first. . Her "modeling agent" Paolo (can't look up his last name now, but DJT made him an ambassador somewhere)) brought her in with some visa. I read something (I read so much they all bleed into each other) but maybe a Vanity Fair article from their archives years ago. Her roomate was a photographer for Marie-Claire magazine and she would beg him to get her work, but he said she was always stiff and couldn't move and why she couldn't get work. It's okay. She knew what parts to move to make a living and hook a billionaire.

Whatistobedone's avatar

I kind of heard some of your info....but cynical me...(now an affliction) thinks there's more than meets the eye...Einstein visa. Think how LUDICROUS that is. Sigh.

Robin D's avatar

EPSTEIN, not Einstein visa...although she does probably know how to say "yes" and "how much" in 5 languages.

James Coyle's avatar

If we have a piano player, he won't be as good as Jelly Roll Morton.

Robin D's avatar

But can he play YMCA on the ivory keys?

James Coyle's avatar

That would be a job requirement.

RichConx's avatar

Hi Steve,

I’ve met DJ Jazzy Jeff, he’s far cooler and classier than anything Trump ever touches (or ruins). By the way, I heard on the news today that the section of the East Room that was demolished is actually where the First Lady’s staff works. Any truth to that? And if so, what should we make of such a defiling act? Inquiring minds want to know...

Maui Wahine's avatar

The first First Lady who had an office there was Eleanor Roosevelt, so it has tremendous historical significance. Canʻt express how angry I am about this. I have friends who are historical preservationists in the NPS and they are heartbroken.

Robin D's avatar

That's so painful Maui. 😥

RichConx's avatar

It was a shocking and disturbing photo to see. But it begs the question for me, why would he wreck the First Lady's, otherwise known as his wife, office area?

Robin D's avatar

Because she is useless and never uses it and probably has no staff and she despises him and he couldn't care less about her or history. She is never there. Jackie Kennedy is turning in her grave. She is the one that was really responsible for redoing the White House in the 1960s, appreciating its history, choosing the appropriate furnitute and art, working with historians, and having her friend, "Bunny" Mellon the renowned horticulturalist, gardener and philanthropist do her beautiful Rose Garden. What did she do in 1.0? Put in a tennis court that Orange Bloviating Behemoth could never use, and even redid the Rose Garden ripping out plants and flowers.

RichConx's avatar

Or maybe he was just angry with her for some reason and decided to demolish her office out of spite. Yikes! That might sound like a stretch, but with this (mis)administration, nothing seems out of bounds. God help us all.

Robin D's avatar

It's a stretch, but appreciate the comment 🙏

RichConx's avatar

Definitely a stretch. Still, witnessing the aftermath of his demolition, what it did to that legendary, historical, museum-like room, was both appalling and disheartening.

Robin D's avatar

I don't think "Verst Lady" has a staff anymore, does she? She never did anything away. She's pay for play. Probably has to drop a million in her acct in bitcoin or in the Cayman islands for an appearance.

CenNEyer's avatar

Yes, I’ve thought of that specifically. First Lady doesn’t use it but future one may and previous ones have. I think that’s where the Rose Garden was too. Who needs women??? Makes me sick!!!

Charles Goetze's avatar

Law suites to stop this defacement of the people’s house should commence immediately. Congress must be on board for any such modifications. Wake up no need to wait and see what’s happened ten years from now file

law suites immediately!!!

Whatistobedone's avatar

Law suits....ultimately squelched by SCROTI 5 + 1 ... afterall, THEY crowned the king, the Fuhrer.

Frances Kern's avatar

AMEN, Charles - but FYI - it is lawsuits, not law suites! :)

Turbinator's avatar

Totally agree Steve. If not destroyed, it will forever be venerated as the "Trump Ballroom" by generations of Republicans to come.

As with the Qatari "gifted" Gilded-Glider, I think he should take his golden stick-ons in the Oval Office and the "Ballroom" with him and pay to have the Whitehouse restored to it's unpretentious, historical grandeur when he leaves office.

Robin D's avatar

Hopefully he will be leaving office feet first, and he's not getting Arlington and an eternal flame. Let them erect a sign "The Donald J Trump Memorial Ballroom Was Here" and drop his body in the cement like Jimmy Hoffa when they tear it down and pave over it.

And by the way, " Gilded-Glider" and golden stick-ons.😂 I take my laughs where I can get them. Thanks for the chuckle.

Whatistobedone's avatar

Haha..😅....thank YOU...for several chuckles!

Scott Citron's avatar

The first video I saw of this desecration yesterday made me sick. My stomach turned and my brain pounded with distress. This pathetic man and his weak enablers must be stopped now. But how?

Gammyjill's avatar

You know, even redoing small parts of an historic building (which the White House is), the paperwork and permit applications are endless. And then, town zoning committees have to approve.

Who oversaw the property changing work? Who signed off on the construction permits? Why wasn’t all of this monitored?

FOLLOW THE MONEY.

Maui Wahine's avatar

There is an organization called CREW (Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington) that has an excellent track record of FOIA and other litigation. Send them a few bucks and ask them to get on this ASAP. I have been donating to them monthly since Trump 1.0.

mary M keymer's avatar

Thank You Steve ...Words cannot express how much I agree with you. This has sickened me to my core. If it stands and I still have my health I will leave the country. Thank god you have laid out a plan for any dem running for president. If they don't tear it down it will cause untold pain to millions of us. He is the most despicable person ... I read that he is planning on building an arch across from the Lincoln Memorial for our 250 year celebration . It's name Arc de Trump ..Somebody help us please... lost in america