Bulwark Takes - Trump’s Library Looks Like a Wedding Venue in Hell

Episode Date: April 1, 2026

Sam Stein, JVL, and Andrew Egger give their takes on the newly unveiled “Donald J. Trump Presidential Library” that Trump now himself admits will “most likely” be a hotel. The crew digs into the absurd renderings, including the giant gold statue, an oversized ballroom, and even the Qatari plane overhauled to become Air Force One in the lobby. They also break down how valuable land originally owned by Miami Dade College was transferred to the state and then handed over for the Trump "library."Read more from JVL on the latest Trump family grift: https://www.thebulwark.com/p/the-great-trump-library-robbery

Hey, everyone. It's Sam Stein again. Look, you're about to watch a video about the Trump Presidential Library, which was debuted by Trump's on Eric Trump a couple days ago. In between us recording the video, talking about this kind of ridiculous library and speculating on what it might actually be used for, President Donald Trump himself ended the speculation saying the following. Trump presidential library. It's a huge skyscraper. Is that all a library? What else is going in? Well, it's a library.

It's a museum or library. It's the presidential. But I wouldn't start it until I'm out of office. I don't believe in building libraries or museums. It's really like the Barack Hussein Obama, one in Chicago, in not a good location, and it's a very unattractive building that's seriously late and seriously over budget. I think you're going to see a great one here. And it'll go up on time, on budget, best location in Miami.

They say it's the best block in Miami and the state worked with us. People live in the floors. No, it's going to be most likely a hotel. You know, this concept could be office, but it's most likely going to be a hotel with a beautiful building underneath. And a 747 Air Force One in the lobby, which is going to be a trick. All right. So there you have it.

It's not going to be a library. It's going to probably be a hotel, maybe an office space. You know, maybe a casino. We'll see. You should still watch the video because we are going to, dissect what this thing looks like from an architectural standpoint. We're going to talk about the griff that went into it and just sort of how much it is in outrage that there's this big 50 foot tall golden Trump statue that's apparently planned for this place.

So enjoy the video. Subscribe to the feed. We'll catch you later. Hey, everyone. It's me Sam Stey. I'm managing under the book. I'm joined by JVL and Andrew Eger are in-house architectural design experts. And it's important to have expertise on for this take because we're going to be looking at

the unveiled renderings of the Donald Trump presidential library introduced to us by Eric Trump in a video last night. It's unfortunate that Tim is not on this one because he seems to be the one who likes the Trump aesthetic the most of those on staff. I was not particularly a fan of this building, but we'll get to why in a little bit. Before we start this, we're going to play the video and then we're going to talk about specific parts of the video, but strap in because you got about a minute in 20 or so, second. of footage coming your way about the future Donald J. Trump presidential library.

Oh, my. All right. So a notable absence of books from this library in this rendering. But other than that, JVL, what are your thoughts? I mean, it really is the Trump presidential casino and event space. I'm Ron Burgundy. I mean, what this sizzle reel highlights is. is look at this lovely outdoor space we have,

if you'd like to rent it for an outdoor wedding, or if you are hosting other events, we have a lovely ballroom space in here. And here's where we'll put the plane and also a Marine one and also a fighter jet. Yeah, there was a fighter jet there. And then we have, you know, but if TED talks,

if that's what your event planning needs, require what we have this lovely amphitheater with a giant gold fist raised I mean let's pull up the amphitheater because I think that one stood out to basically everyone on the internet that is a giant gold strump statue I mean giant that would make Kim Jong-un blush I feel like and it's 50 stories which I mean again I don't mean to to get into logistics but typically you don't do high rises for places that you expect a lot of public in and out traffic because that all has to be managed via elevators. And so this idea like, well, it's going to be for tourists and what, how? How are you going to accommodate tourists in it? So I think this is meant to be rented out.

I think that's the whole point of this is it's a place to rent out. And we'll talk about the location of this venue, which is called the Trump presidential venue. Right. So in terms of logistics, I think that's an important point, which they seem to get second consideration, if not third, when they're doing these designs. I mentioned that because there's this New York Times article over the weekend about the ballroom. I don't know if you guys saw this one. And they sort of broke down how silly the outlines of it were. There's a giant staircase in the front that leads literally to nowhere. Just a bunch of stairs up to some columns. And then you have to walk around to get into the side entrance. And they just like these ornamental things that have no actual use. And so for them to put a amphitheater with a huge

Trump statue ostensibly on some floor up there will cause problems. You're going to have to have some serious elevators like working back and forth. I mean, that, that venue looks like it probably holds somewhere between 500 and 1,000 people. 500 and 1,000 people at the same time for the same event up and down through elevators. Like, I'm sorry, it's going to take it's going to take a minute. Andrew, what do you think of the statue? Are you fan? Obviously, I'm a big fan. I'm a big fan of sort of like restrained classical realism of the architectural style that Donald Trump has always really leaned into. And it's tasteful. It's modest. And I think that's some of the good things about it. On the subject of the stairs, I thought maybe this was like, you know, going up to the ballroom, I thought maybe this was like one of the lessons that they took away from January 6th.

Sometimes it's nice to have sort of confusing features. like that on the outside of important buildings. You just get the mobs going in the incorrect directions. But the one thing I would say, I guess there's two things about the, about the whole maca, but the whole sizzle reel. There's like one thing it says about the future and one thing about the present. And the thing about the future, I totally agree with JVL. I think this is like a pretty good insight into the role that Donald Trump sees himself

playing in sort of post presidency politics, if there is going to be one for him. And I think it's less like being. any sort of like elder statesman of like policy or anything like that for the party. But I do think he really loves the current role that he that he that he has at Mar-a-Lago where, you know, basically anybody who's anybody has to come to him. It's like a center of political gravity. You have to physically go there, be at his club in order to sort of like curry favor. And it's a really high status thing in Trump world. If you like have your wedding there or things like, things like that. And I think this is, you know, just sort of the next iteration of that whole thing. You know, he's going

have to go back and live there full time. Maybe he doesn't want parties all the time, but at least he will have that sort of center of political gravity. And then as far as the present is concerned, I just, I just, the ballroom thing is so funny. I'm sorry. Like the, it's so funny that it occupies so much of his mental real estate right now. You know, there's all this other shit going on in the world. And yet, you know, the president's getting up on Air Force One. And he's holding up his big, you know, like poster board with with the ballroom renderings. And he's, he got unhappy with his first architect, so he fired him. He's like, he's obviously micromanaging, like, everything about this ballroom. And that's here, too. I mean, like, what are the big- Let's pull up the ballroom picture?

Yeah, what are the big accomplishments of the second Trump term as sort of evidenced by what they're showing or deciding to showcase at the library? Is this big fucking ballroom he built, which is going to be, I guess, behind, like, glass. So, like, I don't know if it really functions as an event space or if it's just like a replica for people to sort of gock at and say, what a great ballroom. Great job. So this is, I'm confused by this, because this is, I mean, clearly this is also the picture of the White House ballroom as they're envisioning it. Is the suggestion that they're going to have a replica of the new, soon-to-be-new White House ballroom in this tower? And if so, it looks like it's ground level there?

Is it going to be ground level at the tower? But the big takeaway from the Times piece about the ballroom specifically was that it's absurdly large and that you're not going to have events where there's, 2,000 people at every single event. If you have event with like 400 people, which is very reasonable, the ballroom is gonna look absurd. It's gonna look completely empty. And so, you know, these audacious, huge, showy pieces

that they're doing don't really serve a practical purpose. Can I weigh in one more time, just on this picture that we have up on the screen right now because I'm totally fascinated about it. It blows me away. Like it looks like it's just a rendering of the White House ballroom, right? And it is like obviously,

this thing as it exists in this picture is not going to exist anywhere on any level of this, of this, you know, giant high rise. But, but then there's the plate glass window. And there are the people who are outside of it who are also dressed in like their black tie attire who are like looking through it. So like are these the, are these the visitors? Are these the tourists to the museum who are like, the one way mirror actually, Andrew? It's like the Truman Show. Yeah. You get to, you get to have the two, the, the twofer. You get to have like your glitterati of maga like in your ballroom, having your fancy event. And then you get like the normal mag of people outside and they get to have the fun

experience of watching a fancy dinner through one way glass. It's very strange. Sure. Yeah. Well, you know what? It would be wild if they do a replica of this ballroom in the Trump Tower library. Because after we pull down that fucking real ballroom in Washington, the replica will be the only one of it left.

Yeah. Well, maybe that's why they have to build the second one. There's other replicas that popped up in the video. The one that kind of confused me the most was the Rose Garden, and we can pull that up. So something's wrong with this, as you can tell. Is that a scene? Is that a garden or is that like a green screen? Because are they going to have like a little space there?

Is that the colonnade? I couldn't really quite tell because that's not how it looks normally in the White House. Usually it goes out to the actual line. AI slop. Oh, man. Isn't that the answer here? It's just AI slop. Also, just so everyone knows,

Trump removed the actual garden part of the Rose Garden. So currently, as it exists, it's just pavement with these umbrella chairs from Dural or Marlago that he brought with them. And so this doesn't make sense. I'm not sure what's going on there. I had waived off the idea

of it being AI sloped just because these are like the professional rendering supposedly from this firm that they have, you know, detailed. But actually, the more I look at this picture, the more JVL is totally right. If you look at like the faces along the wall in those portraits on the right there. Did you actually think they were actors that they hired? No, no, I just thought they were like normal, normal architectural mockups, right? Like of the sort that every project has done forever.

But, but 100% these are a guy generated. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, look, look, there are some some real lookers who have been presidents in the past judging by these framed pictures going along the right here. I don't think those words up top actually spell anything. So, yeah, I apologize that it was not immediately evident to me that these were AI-stop. Let's pull up the Oval Office, the Oval Office image that they're putting in. This one, I mean, it's not crazy to have a replica of the Oval in a library like this.

It's a little weird. It's a little weird. It's a little weird. I'm assuming some other. I think they do. Bill was saying earlier, I think some of the other libraries already have this sort of thing. And, like, I think the Ted Kennedy Library has a replica of his office or something of that. That does look like Bill Barr to me in the far right, the guy.

It does. Doesn't that kind of like Bill Barr? Bill Barr talking to Kerry Lake and George H.W. Bush. I don't know. So I guess the attractions here, you can maybe see a replica of the Oval. You can maybe see a replica of the Rose Garden. You can definitely see the Air Force One. My assumption is that's the Katari one.

I am sorry, but there is a 0.0% chance that they would take a $300 million plane and stick it in a building because that is what we call a wasting asset. That thing is valuable. It can be used. That makes no zero sense at all. Don't they have it in the Reagan one though? They have a plan in the regular one.

Maybe a decommissioned one. Yeah. But we are in the process of paying to retrofit this thing and take it apart bolt by bolt to take out all the listening bugs and stuff from Qatar that are baked into it. I am. I just, I refuse to believe that they would put a full, functional up-to-spec Air Force One and just lock it away under class.

The thing that confuses me about the Air Force One is maybe I'm wrong about this. It's a bit in a minute since I brushed up. But this sort of like classic, the baby blue color scheme of Air Force One, isn't this the one that Trump is doing away with? I mean, like he has brought us back. Like his model is like a Trump Force One. And I don't understand why this is the one that's being mocked up. I guess it's maybe just as more AI slop is the answer.

Lazyness from the design team. Get on that, guys. Trump doesn't like this one. He's the only one who doesn't like this one. And I guess we can't end this without talking about just the sheer size of this building because it's enormous. So let's pull up that last one against the Miami skyline. Just for some backstory.

They took this property from a local college. I guess the college felt like it should donate it. No, no. Sam. Sam, it's so much more corrupt than that. Give us a story. So this was one of the last. undeveloped parcels on Biscayne Boulevard, which is an incredibly very valuable piece of land.

It was just a surface parking lot. And it belonged to a local college. It was Miami-Dade College. So the college transfers the property to the state of Florida. The state of Florida then assigned by Rhonda. DeSantis, then transfers the property to the Trump Library Foundation. The estimated value of this property ranges from $76 million to the hundreds of millions of dollars.

Nobody knows because if you would put this thing on the open market, God knows what it would have fetched. And what we have here is a vice chair of the board of Miami-Dade College, Roberto Alonzo, said, I think this is a further expansion of an educational facility. Presidential libraries are places where you can go and research. This is how they justify it themselves. So the entire thing is just as corrupt as the day is long. Again, it's three acres of like the most prime real estate you can possibly have in downtown Miami.

And it just went faux-free. To the Trump family, and they're going to monetize the shit of this. Could probably, I don't know, build housing for the city. You could probably build commercial real estate. You could do anything. Commercial real estate, right? I mean, you could have been, but here's the thing. This thing is going to turn into commercial real estate.

It'll just be commercial real estate by any other name. It's this giant 50-story tower, which is going to be used primarily for like events and rentals. and the nonprofit foundation that is the Trump presidential library foundation will just collect money off of it. And who will be in control of the Trump Library Foundation, the Trump family? It's just more grift. It's amazing. It's amazing. I will say this is, I was talking with Andrew about DeSantis earlier today because he's had some interesting tweets that suggests maybe discomfort.

But this makes me a second guess. Sam has been. like grinding this axe and Ron DeSanis, you know. Are there a dollar? He, I will say he also just named. Yeah, he's naming the, he's renaming the Palm Beach Airport, President Donald J. Trump International Airport, and he's given him, you know, all this free real estate for the library.

But he also had this tweet, you know, about this backhanded compliment about the, about AI stocks. And I don't know, man. So, yeah, look forward to that in a morning shots, I guess. Can we talk briefly about the aesthetic of the tower itself and how it is a carbon copy of the Freedom Tower in New York, but only littler. And so

somebody is going to put these two things next to each other in a proportional rendering, and you will see how much the two of them look the same, except that the Trump Miami tower is half the size. Yeah, but relative to the rest of

Miami, it's fucking nasty. Relative to the rest of Miami, it's enormous. I don't want to be able to put any ideas in Trump's head, because if you remember, I mean, they fired, he fired that first ballroom designer, as I was mentioned before, in part because Trump wanted to keep making the ballroom bigger and bigger and bigger. And a certain point, the architect was like, look, man, we got to, we got to worry about matters of scale. Oh, here we go. Again, this isn't scale. This is, so what you're seeing is not scale. If we put these things at scale, the Trump Tower

would be half the size. It would go up to a little bit further of, yeah. It's identical. We are, we are one bad, like, Oval Office presentation. way. All they have to do, somebody has to carry in that scale presentation to the president. And all of a sudden, this screenshot on the left here is half the building. Do a popsicle stick model of the two and be like, Mr. President, take a look at this. This information must be kept from the president at all costs. You know, the skyline of Miami has suffered enough. So I, this is confession. I'm not proud of this fact, but I have never rooted so hard for climate change. For the city, Miami to become just flooded. Because let me tell you, seeing this place underwater would be chef's kiss.

What do you think the insurance policies are on this bad boy? It's got to be high. That's why you got to hold all those weddings and bar mitzvahs there. Exactly. I'm going to get a Trump library bar mitzvah for my boy. Let's hope it's built in time. All right, JVL, Andrew, thanks so much. Appreciate it. For those who are actual architects and have some thoughts on what they've just witnessed. Drop them in the comments. We'll take a look. We'll see if we can incorporate them somehow. For those who are not subscribers to our feed, do subscribe.

It's a great place for conversations just like this. Talk you guys later.