The Daily Signal - Victor Davis Hanson: Trump’s Ballroom Is the Least Damning Thing to Happen to the White House

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Starting point is 00:00:25 We'd love to talk. Business. For years, decades, maybe over a century, people have complained that the world's superpower has nowhere at the White House to entertain people. And usually tents are constructed when there's diplomatic or state dinners or there's festivities. Donald Trump, the builder, comes along in his second term and says, you know what? I'm going to solve the problem. I'm going to refashion the east wing of the White House complex and build a beautiful 90,000 square foot ballroom. But people were outraged. Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren and the left who have shut down the government are saying the people don't have enough food or they're not getting paid and Donald Trump is building this luxurious capitalist, oligarchic, aristocratic ballroom.

Starting point is 00:01:13 And if the senators are worried about the people with less means than just open the government. Hello, this is Victor Davis Hansen for the Daily Signal. There's a big controversy that Donald Trump is not just leaving his mark on the country, but he's leaving his mark on the White House. For years, decades, maybe over a century, people have complained that the world's superpower has nowhere at its capital, i.e. executive branch at the White House, to entertain people. And usually tents are constructed when there's diplomatic or state dinners or there's festivities. Donald Trump, the builder, comes along in his second term. says, you know what, I'm going to solve the problem. I'm going to refashion the east wing of the

Starting point is 00:02:11 White House complex and build a beautiful 90,000 square foot ballroom, which will allow 650 guests to eat and be entertained and to have official functions. And more importantly, I am going to enlist people from the private sector to pay for it along with myself. And the price will probably be somewhere between 200 and 300 million. The plans are out there. It's perfectly transparent. There's a list of everybody who's donated. They're not just right-wing donors. There's most of the familiar Silicon Valley grandees, Apple, meta, etc. And it looks pretty much consistent with the style of the White House in general. But people were outraged because to build this huge ballroom, which was sorely needed, you had to demolish the area where it will connect into the East

Starting point is 00:03:10 complex. And, of course, that's always messy. So immediately, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren and the left who have shut down the government are saying, the people don't have enough food, or they're not getting paid, and Donald Trump is building this luxurious capitalist, oligarchic, aristocratic hallway. No. It's for all of America. It's being privately paid, and if the senators are worried about the people with less means than just open the government.

Starting point is 00:03:39 But more importantly, it wasn't more than a nanosecond when the media left and right started to give examples that refurbishing, remodeling, redoing the White House is very common since its origins. It was burned down the war of 1812, completely rebuilt. FDR, who suffered from paralysis. wanted to put an indoor swimming pool. He did, and then it was torn out by a later administration made into a press room. Jerry Ford wanted to swim, so he has an outdoor swimming pool. He just tore up the garden and made a swimming pool, and people use it to this day. Barack Obama wanted to refashion a tennis court into a basketball court. He did just that. Harry Truman came in and said, this White House is creaky. I don't feel that it's up to code. I'm going to move to Blair House for four or five years and gut the entire White House, and they did. So we doing the White House is nothing

Starting point is 00:04:44 new. Having private donors pay for it is advisable, nothing new. But then there was this all this argument that it belittles the sanctity of the White House, this ugly scar that we're watching as the demolition crews break up the existing East Wing to attach this ballroom. But Gavin Newsom was one of the most severe critics, but if you look at the California historic state capital, it's been demolished almost. There is an ugly wound where the whole side of it has been gutted and you can look into the ruin. And why?

Starting point is 00:05:22 Because it's necessary if you want to expand the offices, the parking garage, and the facilities, the cafeteria, the gym, everything for the Democratic supermajorities in California. And remember in California, we only have nine of 52 Republican congresspeople. Both senators are Democratic. No statewide officeholder is Republican. And there's supermajorities in both legislature. And they voted that they wanted to spend not 200 million, not 300 million, not 300 million, 400 million, not 800 million, not a billion, but a billion six, and not from META or Amazon

Starting point is 00:06:05 or Elon Musk or any of those people, but from the taxpayers who are facing a 20 to 30 billion dollar deficit. And that wound makes the White House wound look small in comparison. The job is much more vast, and guess what? It will probably suffer the fate of high-speed rail and be delayed and delayed as it already has at the expense. not of private donors, but of the taxpayer. A final note, do we really want to know what belittles the White House? I mean, we're just coming off the Biden administration where cocaine was found in a carol in the West Wing. And nobody seemed to want to investigate whether it had anything to do with the former cocaine addict and presidential son Hunter Biden.

Starting point is 00:06:53 But it was found there. Do you remember when Barack Obama was president? brought in a whole cadre of Muslim Brotherhood people that were tied to Hamas, Islamic terrorism. He brought an entourage in 2012 into the White House. I remember 2016, he thought it would be neat to have his favorite rappers in the White House. Kenrick Lamar, pimp a butterfly. Remember those lyrics about killing the police in the White House, that rapper, Kill Popo, as he said. Then there was the rapper Rick Ross.

Starting point is 00:07:26 Remember everybody was sitting in the assault. him occasion in our nation's executive mansion and his beeper went out because he was a criminal who was under house arrest as part of a sentence for assault and battery and he had been accused of kidnapping and all of a sudden in front of this presidential entourage Michelle here, Barack here, his beeper goes off on his ankle bracelet. We could go on with the embarrassing incidents. I won't mention what transpired between Monica Lewinsky and Bill Clinton right off the Oval Office in the presidential lavatory. But nonetheless, the ballroom was needed. It's paid for by private funds. It will be built efficiently, quickly, quite unlike what we see in California

Starting point is 00:08:15 with taxpayers' money and incompetence and regulations. And the left who shut down the the government is angry, but it doesn't really know what it's angry about other than it just wants to be angry. Thank you very much. This is Victor Davis-Hansson for The Daily Signal. Thank you for tuning in to The Daily Signal. Please like, share, and subscribe to be notified for more content like this. You can also check out my own website at Victor Hansen.com and subscribe for exclusive features in addition. You know,

The Daily Signal - Victor Davis Hanson: Trump’s Ballroom Is the Least Damning Thing to Happen to the White House

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