According to a YouGov poll released Wednesday, only one-in-four Americans approve of the East Wing demolition.
Republicans don’t like it either: 55% do not approve.
And it’s not just because he’s created a canker sore where last week there was history and beauty. Perhaps it’s because he doesn’t care and treats our property as though it were his.
This is not the first time Donald Trump has taken a bulldozer to a historical icon: he did it to Bonwit Teller in New York City when breaking ground for Trump Tower. That wasn’t a popular move, either.
Trump consulted no one who reviews and authorizes changes to government buildings, specifically the White House. No public review. No public comment. And as far as we know, no historical preservation. The National Park Service head (who indirectly reports to Trump) said ‘we only handle construction, not demolition.’
What has become of the paintings, statues and furniture? Did they go the way of the Bonwit Teller friezes? (He promised them to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, then demolished them instead.)
Donors for the $300 million grotesque ballroom
The outrage expressed this week led Trump to release a list of corporate, philanthropic and individual donors. No sums, of course. And we have to take his word that they signed on and only they signed on.
- Altria Group, Inc.
- Amazon
- Apple
- Booz Allen Hamilton
- Caterpillar, Inc.
- Coinbase
- Comcast Corporation
- J. Pepe and Emilia Fanjul
- Hard Rock International
- HP Inc.
- Lockheed Martin
- Meta Platforms
- Micron Technology
- Microsoft
- NextEra Energy, Inc.
- Palantir Technologies Inc.
- Ripple
- Reynolds American
- T-Mobile
- Tether America
- Union Pacific Railroad
~~~
- Adelson Family Foundation
- Benjamin Leon Jr.
- Betty Wold Johnson Foundation
- Cameron Winklevoss
- Charles and Marissa Cascarilla
- Edward and Shari Glazer
- Harold Hamm
- Kelly Loeffler and Jeff Sprecher
- Konstantin Sokolov
- Paolo Tiramani
- Stefan E. Brodie
- Stephen A. Schwarzman
- The Laura & Isaac Perlmutter Foundation
- The Lutnick Family
- Tyler Winklevoss
History is unlikely to treat them kindly.
About the bunker under the East Wing
CBS reported this as an aside yesterday: The White House Military Office will upgrade the bunker (President’s Emergency Operations Center, PEOC) under the East Wing.
Did you know there was a bunker under the East Wing?
President Franklin D. Roosevelt built it during WWII for use as a communications center. Then President Harry Truman expanded it and turned it into a bomb shelter as well.
Trump’s excavation of the East Wing made it possible to “upgrade” the PEOC. Given everything else going on in this administration … it’s probably not a surprise that one of the first things I thought of was this, from Wikipedia:
Hitler took up residence in the Führerbunker on 16 January 1945, and it became the centre of the Nazi regime until the last week of World War II in Europe.
Who else has palatial bunkers? Putin.
Known for gnawing at complex questions like a terrier with a bone. Digital evangelist, writer, teacher. Transplanted Southerner; teach newbies to ride motorcycles. @kegill (Twitter and Mastodon.social); wiredpen.com