Showing off his effortless calm and generous spirit, President Trump was captured in a video joking with workers currently renovating the White House. In the clip, which went viral on social media, Trump tosses the men signed MAGA hats, and jokes that they are worth, “$25,000 on eBay.”
For context, these workers were most likely part of the massive renovations to the White House, which include a 90,000 square foot addition for a new ballroom, which Trump offered to fund during the 2024 campaign personally.
In any case, the viral clip shows Trump sitting at the Resolute desk, tossing singed MAGA hats to the hardworking construction workers. He quipped that the signed hats were worth “25,000 on eBay,” and told one of the men he made ” a great catch.” Closing out the short vlip, Trump remarked that,” I respect talented people.”
Several weeks ago, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt announced the construction of a new ballroom. She stated, “The White House state ballroom will be a much-needed and exquisite addition of 90,000 square feet.” Building on this point, she noted that the new addition would have a seated capacity of 650 people and would eliminate the need for a “large and unsightly tent” to host state dinners and other significant events.
Adding more context, White House chief of staff Susie Wiles said in a statement, “The president and the Trump White House are fully committed to working with the appropriate organizations to preserve the special history of the White House while building a beautiful ballroom that can be enjoyed by future Administrations and generations of Americans to come.”
Speaking about the plans in the early months of his presidency, Trump declared, The people outside, they can’t even get in. This room is packed. And, you know, I offered to build a ballroom. I’m very good at building ballrooms. I build beautiful ballrooms. And I actually offered to build a ballroom for the White House. I was going to build it right there. This was going to be the reception room. And then I was going to build a beautiful, beautiful ballroom like I have at Mar a Lago, as beautiful as it can be.”
Describing his magnanimous offer to the Biden administration, he added, “It was going to cost about $100 million. I offered to do it, and I never heard back. I offered this. I offered to do it to the Biden administration, a very active administration. They didn’t hear back. And I said again and again, three, four times I said to the top people, and they just didn’t know what to do. They sort of said, ‘This is good,’ but they had no idea.”
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Watch Trump with the construction workers here:
Concluding his comments, Trump declared that he would cover the tab, saying, “It’s going to cost nothing. I’ll spend the whole thing myself, or we’ll do a big, beautiful room, but we could use it at the White House. You know what they do when they have a big ceremony to put up a tent. And somehow, I think we’ve outgrown the tent stuff, right? Don’t you think so?”
Watch the clip of Trump’s announcement here:
Featured image from embedded video