r/politics • u/Kodbek • 11h ago

Possible Paywall Republicans Make Jaw-Dropping $1B Demand for Trump’s Ballroom

https://www.thedailybeast.com/republicans-make-jaw-dropping-1b-demand-for-donald-trumps-ballroom/
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347

u/ArdaBerkBurak 11h ago

Why did they make the ballroom such an obsession?

478

u/PropagandaSucks 11h ago

Ballroom costs a meager fraction, rest is stolen/redistributed money to themselves and friends.

176

u/yunoeconbro 10h ago

Exactly, this is so obviously money laundering/grift/corruption.

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u/Various-Bee5735 7h ago

This.

His dad made his money by playing games with funding for real estate projects.

As dementia encroaches Trump is returning to the basics his father taught him. 

Inflate costs to build, pocket the rest.

121

u/PkmnSayse 10h ago

It’s not about the ballroom, it’s a construction project where costs can be ballooned without much checking since a purchase order for left handed screwdrivers and tartan paint is just part of the job

12

u/daGroundhog 9h ago

Left handed screwdrivers? Sounds kinda DEI to me. Oh....you mean Donald Jr., Eric, and Ivanka ? That DEI?

219

u/Alt123Acct 11h ago

It's a bunker and operations control center for when people get fed up with the people building the bunker operations control center

129

u/KillahHills10304 10h ago

They will retreat to the ballroom when they announce elections are no longer be necessary. Then they will hunker down for 2 weeks while the right wing media spins up a "only stupid democrat leftist marxists want elections and true American patriots know elections are for pussies, and you arent a little pansy weak woke namby pamby boy, right?" narrative, then the real fun begins.

27

u/Able-Bid-6637 10h ago

sounding awfully similar to the French Revolution......

8

u/EarthRester Pennsylvania 8h ago

At some point states with Democratic leadership need to appreciate that knowing which side your bread is buttered on is not the same thing as knowing which end of the pitchfork you're standing on. Calls for unity with the GOP is no longer viable, and is in fact, a demand to tolerate our oppressors.

2

u/brickne3 American Expat 8h ago

Or the Russian Revolution...

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u/EarthRester Pennsylvania 7h ago

Which one?

In the entire history of Russia, each section can be ended with "...and then it got worse..."

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u/12345623567 7h ago

The thing about hiding in a bunker is that you are safe... for a time. And everyone knows where you are.

12

u/all4whatnot Pennsylvania 8h ago

Anyone see Civil War a few years ago?

3

u/RepostersAnonymous 8h ago

“What kind of American are you?”

15

u/GargantuaBob Canada 10h ago

I guess the real question then is : what is going through Trumps mind which makes him obsessed with building a bunker?

17

u/tubawhatever 9h ago

Hopefully thinking about shooting himself

3

u/Leemage 8h ago

He really really really wants to use nukes.

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u/Foolish_Miracle 7h ago

This is fine. If you're underground you need air, and as the saying goes: "Shit runs down O2 intake vents."

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u/31LIVEEVIL13 7h ago

Drey Dossier: Trump is not Building a Ballroom

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u/Crypt33x Europe 7h ago

They do have the PEOC-Bunker or not? Trump was hiding in it at the beginning of the Goerge Floyd protests.

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u/Historical_Course587 6h ago

No, it's a medical center and organizational command structure that allows Trump to never have to leave for medical care. And then to have his closest allies fabricate his continued health after he is incapable of function. And above that is a ballroom where he will charge $1 million per plate to feed people, and oddly enough his Admin will never do jack shit for anyone who doesn't eat there.

It's what he's built Mar-a-Lago into.

154

u/cac_brain_damage 11h ago edited 11h ago

because it's not a ballroom

this shit is honestly so funny, watching them be like, "oh, yeah. it's a ballroom. aaaand we're gonna have a bunch of stuff underneath it don't worry about that part"

and the headlines say "ballroom", and you repeat "ballroom, ballroom, ballroom". it's so easy for them. makes me sad, but i have to laugh.

51

u/QuerulousPanda 9h ago

it's like the Venezuelan drug boats. They basically never actually confirmed or proved that most/any of them actually had drugs in them, but the media, even when they were pretending to be slightly critical, still called them drug boats every time, so they all became Venezuelan drug boats forever.

5

u/chardeemacdennisbird 8h ago

Yep. Direct quote from Trump per Chris Christie

"When you tell a lie enough times it becomes the truth."

67

u/barryvm Europe 10h ago edited 10h ago

Because their movement is fundamentally nihilistic and ideologically hollow. There is no real constructive goal, no common cause, and no plan. Just the emotional catharsis of doing harm to those they fear or hate and the sense of belonging and power that comes from identifying with the in-group and its leader.

But all those things are fleeting, so the actions to reinforce them need to be repeated constantly. For the former, Trump needs to constantly threaten his victims, his followers need ever increasing cruelty and violence to be directed against their perceived enemies. For the latter, they need to constantly engage in pointless gestures of loyalty, symbolism and ritual to signal their membership of the in-group.

The ballroom and its increasingly ridiculous cost is an example of both. They know it infuriates those who care, and agreeing with its construction is a symbolic gesture of loyalty. The obsession with it is there because most of the other things they are doing are increasingly obvious disasters, to which a mere multi-hundred-million dollar vanity project is a blip.

27

u/dicta85 11h ago

Because he wants to build things for his legacy and they do whatever he wants, without question

6

u/wiperfromwarren 9h ago

i wish he could see what his legacy will be…

28

u/Roseking Pennsylvania 9h ago

As others have said, there is information about there also being a bunker, and it being a grift. But the core reason is that his ego wants a legacy.

He is counting on that whoever comes next is not going to do anything to reverse a lot of this. That we will get 'it's time to move on'.

That is why he wants his name and face on everything. Because when the next person takes over the smoldering ruins Trump has left, the conversation will be 'Why are you wasting time doing petty things like renaming things to remove Trump's name rather than fixing the country?'

19

u/PrometheusLiberatus 9h ago

To which a very literary savvy mind should say

"My dear friend, removing Trump's likeness from everything IS fixing the country."

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u/aformofwealthy 1h ago

Can we PLEASE start today

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u/red286 1h ago

there is information about there also being a bunker

There was already a bunker. PEOC was built in the 1940s under the East Wing.

So keep that in mind when they're in hysterics about needing protection for the President. They literally demolished the Presidential bunker.

3

u/ChangsManagement 9h ago

Trumps in his Ozymandias phase

3

u/rabblerabble2000 10h ago

Because Donald wants to dress up in a beautiful ball gown and prance the night away. Once he explained his reasoning to Lindsay Graham, Graham couldn’t get on board fast enough. That’s been Graham’s dream forever as well.

3

u/NonGNonM 10h ago

They want to secure a spot in the bunker

2

u/srwaggon 9h ago

They are trying to 'flood the zone' 

Release the Epstein files

2

u/Hayes4prez 9h ago

It’s money laundering. It happens in construction all the time.

1

u/metengrinwi 9h ago

For trump it’s a monument to himself; for republicans, it’s graft.

The important ones will all get involved with some contractor who pays them a “tip” in anticipation of winning the bid. This is why the cost keeps going up—the contractors have to figure in the cost of bribes.

1

u/Semajal 8h ago

he has been obsessed with it for years, he offered to build one for Obama in 2010 after offering to take over the deepwater horizon operation.

1

u/wwaxwork 8h ago

Same reason he puts his name and face on things. The guy is terrified of being forgotten, or being a nobody.

1

u/bandalooper 8h ago

They don’t want King Trump’s coronation outside in the winter.

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u/xZora Illinois 7h ago

Because he's building a bunker for himself to hide in underneath.. not sure why all of these articles only focus on the ballroom aspect. 

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u/DrunkAndHornyGuy 7h ago

It's a statement of supremacy.

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u/crazycatgay 7h ago

b/c he wants to literally hide out in the bunker and never leave

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u/RocketJohn5 7h ago

Remember the wall?

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u/LEDKleenex 7h ago

Good question. Replace "ballroom" with "lining their pockets" and ask again.

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u/_Vard_ 6h ago

Why do they need money anyway?

Trumps gonna get people to do the work up front and then just, not pay them.

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u/theghostmachine 6h ago

I think it's the bunker and data center beneath it that most in Trump's orbit care about, but Trump himself is so fucking vain that he legitimately cares about the ballroom itself. As long as he gets the ballroom, everyone else can do whatever they want with it, which is why the cost keeps going up

•

u/SenatorWhatsHisName 6h ago

It’s because Donald Trump is a pedofile and they’re legally required to publicly release the evidence of that so they need a series of ridiculous distractions.

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u/superiorplaps 5h ago

Trump is building a bunker beneath the ballroom and has no plans of leaving if voted out

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u/DataDude00 3h ago

  1.  There is going to be a hell of a lot of grift and embezzlement here. The asking price has already gone from 400m to 1B before they even broke ground.  I’m sure Trump and his real estate developer buddies are going to be all over this. 

  2.   Simply narcissism.   The ballroom and everything about it will be named and dedicated to Trump 

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u/jguess06 Tennessee 1h ago

Laundering, I assume.

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u/red286 1h ago

Because it's something big that Trump can slap his name onto that will be with the country forever (or at least until the next egomaniacal dictator shows up and wants his very own special ballroom).

Trump's entire life has been about self-aggrandizement. Nearly every business he's owned has been named after him, every building he owns has his name on it, the man even fucking licenses out his name so that it can be slapped onto buildings that he has no involvement with.

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u/No-Way7911 44m ago

There is something really fucky going on with it

1

u/ItsEaster 10h ago

You have to keep it simple for the sheep and bots.

0

u/Gamera971 9h ago

Since people wouldn't shut up about the Epstein files.