The White House is playing defense after video and images of the demolition of the East Wing went viral and caused outrage as renovations for President Donald Trump‘s $250 million ballroom broke ground.
The Office of Communications pushed back against criticisms of Trump’s White House makeover, pointing out that the major reconstruction of the East Wing is part of “a proud presidential legacy.”
“In the latest instance of manufactured outrage, unhinged leftists and their Fake News allies are clutching their pearls over President Donald J. Trump’s visionary addition of a grand, privately funded ballroom to the White House — a bold, necessary addition that echoes the storied history of improvements and renovations from commanders-in-chief to keep the executive residence as a beacon of American excellence,” the White House said in a fact sheet released to the press.
The White House added, “For more than a century, U.S. Presidents have been renovating, expanding, and modernizing the White House to meet the needs of the present day.”
The fact sheet includes a historical timeline of past presidential renovations at the White House, including former President Barack Obama‘s addition of a basketball court on the South Lawn.
In 2009, America’s first Black president added basketball lines and baskets to the tennis courts. In 2011, President Obama notably celebrated his 50th birthday with a game of basketball with NBA stars like LeBron James, Chris Paul, and Derrick Rose, as well as Magic Johnson, who came out of retirement for the presidential matchup.
The Trump White House also noted that a kitchen garden was added to the South Lawn–a project spearheaded by former First Lady Michelle Obama.
Other examples included more major renovations, such as President Richard Nixon converting the White House swimming pool into the press briefing room in 1970 and adding a bowling alley in the basement in 1973. In 1962, President John F. Kennedy notably constructed the modern Rose Garden, which the Trump White House completely renovated this year by removing its signature turf for cement.
In reaction to the major demolition to conjoin a pricey ballroom to the East Wing, Yemisi Egbewole, former chief of staff to the White House Office of the Press Secretary during the Biden administration, told theGrio, the “outrage is warranted.”
“This can’t be reversed with some executive order. This is a major renovation by a president who will not even be able to ‘benefit’ from this vanity project,” said Egbewole, who notes that the Trump White House initially “promised not to touch it.”
President Joe Biden‘s former White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre weighed in on the controversy, telling “The View” on Tuesday, “There’s no greater metaphor right now with what’s happening right now in this country, than watching Donald Trump take a wrecking ball to the White House.”
Trump is raising donor funding to pay for the $250 million ballroom, where the White House is expected to host world leaders and foreign dignitaries.
Jean-Pierre added, “The People’s House is basically being sold to the highest bidder. It is corruption at its core.”
Jeremy Edwards, a former White House spokesperson, told theGrio, “While Americans are staring down the barrel of the largest health care price hike in U.S. history, Donald Trump is spending hundreds of millions of dollars on his latest vanity project.”
“The destruction of the White House is the perfect metaphor for what the President has done to our country and the economy,” continued Edwards, who is currently communications advisor at The Century Foundation.
Referring to a $400 million jet Trump received from the Qatari government to construct a new Air Force One, he added, “If anyone sincerely believes he is telling the truth about what this will cost the American taxpayer, I’ve got a Qatari jet to sell you.”
