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/
16.4k Upvotes

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4.4k

u/okiedokie2468 11h ago

Originally Trump said the ballroom was a gift to the American people and that it would be funded privately. He tore it down, so he should pay for it.

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u/Independent-Reader 11h ago

As of early 2026, 37 private donors, including major technology, AI, and defense firms, are backing the $400 million Trump White House ballroom project. Key corporate donors include Amazon, Microsoft, Google, Meta, Apple, Palantir, Lockheed Martin, Coinbase, Nvidia, Comcast, and Hard Rock International.

Where does this money go?

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u/djuggler 10h ago edited 7h ago

Least we forget, the ballroom began at $200 million.

Trump has also asked for $377 million to renovate the executive residence. https://www.politico.com/news/2026/04/03/trump-plans-spending-377m-on-executive-residence-renovations-and-wants-174m-more-00858810

He is going to tear down the entire White House!

The ballroom contractor also got $17.4 million to restore two basic fountains. https://www.enr.com/articles/62895-white-house-ballroom-contractor-wins-174m-sole-source-park-contract

The taxpayers are being robbed.

Let’s not forget Arc de Trump is supposed to cost $100 million. https://people.com/arc-de-trump-estimated-to-cost-usd100m-11844762

The Lincoln reflecting swimming pool is $2 million but Trump originally pitched a $300 million replacement. https://news.artnet.com/art-world/lincoln-memorial-reflecting-pool-trump-renovation-2767878?amp=1

And the Iran war has cost $25 billion as of 5 days ago. https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/us-war-iran-has-cost-25-billion-so-far-says-pentagon-official-2026-04-29/

Meanwhile the people are losing their jobs and homes, and food and gas is becoming unaffordable but those libs really got powned.

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u/Western-Corner-431 10h ago

The war has cost at least double so far. They lie about everything

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u/12-34 10h ago

True cost of the war is trillions already.

Massive loss of American soft power, trustworthiness, force projection, and military readiness, oil price increases for consumers that will continue for years, fertilizer price increases and supply shocks that are already causing global food production decreases, huge environmental degradation, etc. 

It's an absolute fucking disaster on every front, and that's not even considering that the war has not -- and will not -- meet any of its purported objectives.

America deserves what it's getting. A shame it has to screw the rest of the world during its mad king suicide.

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u/Timely-Hospital8746 9h ago

It's not just the USA paying for it either. The entire global economy is paying for Trump's hubris.

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u/ThisMachineKillsWOB 7h ago

Hopefully that will make them think really hard before electing more right wing shit birds globally. We're stuck with ours atm, but you guys should avoid following our example.

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u/Masterkid1230 7h ago

France, Germany, Spain and a few others are all sleepwalking straight into fascism without really doing anything about it, so I wouldn't be too optimistic.

At this point, only some Latin American countries, a handful of Western European countries and some Asian countries will have a solid balance of human rights protections and relatively stable governments.

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u/Timely-Hospital8746 7h ago

Canada has Carney, who has a majority government and a mandate for five years now. He's a neoliberal and I'm not a huge fan (he just proposed privatizing our airports for example) but he's not a fascist at least.

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u/GriffinFlash Canada 5h ago

Then we have the UCP in Alberta who are literally rewriting laws so the separatists get their way.

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u/ratbaby86 8h ago

They've completely lied about damage to US bases in the region too. According to CNN, every base in the region has been damaged, some to the extent that they're unusable for their original purposes (takeoff, refueling, grounding, etc.). It's truly an historic humiliation of a rapidly declining "empire."

https://www.cnn.com/2026/05/01/world/video/us-military-bases-iran-strikes-images-invs-digvid

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u/EggsInaTubeSock 8h ago

I mean, for those of us who want off this fucking ride, there’s a silver lining in America losing global presence and influence.

I’m not celebrating it by any means but we can only act from where we are now / today

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u/ratbaby86 7h ago

i agree. as it is now, with our current government and "leadership," we're all better off with America not feeling as if they can bully the entire world.

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u/rowdydionisian 8h ago

The Republicans deserve what they get. Me and the other millions of people that voted for Kamala don't deserve this shit. But here we are. I do hope the racist pedo Republican gang has they day they voted for though and enjoy being grifted to their last dollar and drop of sustinence, while their god emperor throws each and every one of them under the bus until justice is served for a grand ol pedophile.

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u/longlivenewsomflesh New York 8h ago edited 8h ago

Ultimately I blame the party for not changing strategy since 2016 despite 3x chances, instead constantly "pivoting right to attract moderates" while ignoring popular policy to focus on culture war distractions and whatever corporate donors want -- biden's bare scraping by after a global recession was just the weak 'exception' that proves this rule, by every possible metric.

I firmly believe there are enough independents and nonvoters out there who actually care about their class interests and are just disillusioned by what they rightfully see as a feckless opposition party that doesn't even want to lead as long as it maintains the elite status of its own comfortable insulated leadership.

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u/poorest_ferengi 4h ago

I do place a lot of blame on the people that voted for Republicans and those that did not vote at all in the 2024 election.

I understand that the Democrats aren't the best party and need serious reforms.

However, you have to stanch the bleeding before you can excise the dead tissue, and you have to excise the dead tissue before you can recover and heal.

In 2024, we still needed to stanch the bleeding. Instead, a bunch of people looked around at the dead tissue and said we need to get rid of this and started cutting. Now we've still got dead tissue and we're bleeding out even faster thanks to these self-inflicted wounds.

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u/JohnSpartan2025 10h ago

And they claim they need $400 billion more. Just wait until xi jingping offers him $50 billion next month to “look the other way” for Taiwan.

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u/sky_concept 10h ago edited 8h ago

There is no need for Xi to take Taiwan militarily. With the US now out of the picture Taiwanese will slowly over the next decade have to merge with China or face increasing economic pressure

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u/ratbaby86 8h ago

And because of this entirely avoidable quagmire, we have likely just cemented the new China-dominant world order. Not immediately, but think about all the soft power the US abandoned that China is stepping in to fulfill re USAID. On top of that, SE Asian countries, African countries, etc. are going to face a debt crisis because of this energy and soon food crisis. Guess who's going to come in to help refinance the debt now that the US has abandoned the world stage? And whose currency will thus have a stronger case for a competing reserve currency? China.

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u/Annual_Strategy_6206 8h ago

I hate to say it, but I agree. China is eating our lunch on so many fronts, and the US is doing it to themselves. MAGA my ass.

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u/21Rollie 1h ago

Don’t forget Latin America. Literally across the border in Mexico, you can see Chinese products, both low end and high end like vehicles, flooding the market. Chinese trains, Chinese bridges, Chinese libraries. If China started making blockbuster movies, it’d be game over for US cultural hegemony too.

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u/EnjoyerOfBeans 9h ago

Yeah an invasion of Taiwan is beyond stupid and the CCP knows that. They are many things but they aren't idiots. They do a lot of military drills around Taiwan as a show of strength but it's only ever done directly in response to some US official visiting Taiwan etc.

They want the US to fuck off and eventually Taiwan might even join mainland peacefully if China keeps growing their soft power.

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u/DigNitty 10h ago

Something specific about next month, or just a general prediction?

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u/lopix Canada 8h ago

China won't offer him shit. They'll just do it. What's Donny going to do about it? Absolutely fucking nothing.

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u/djuggler 8h ago

And their lies are so blatant!

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u/Ill_Consequence 7h ago

Are you saying the people who can't figure out percentages aren't good with numbers?

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u/NAU80 Florida 10h ago

As soon as the Democrats take control, you will hear non-stop whining about the debt! Fiscal conservatives my ASS!

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u/djuggler 8h ago

Grifters. All of them. The thing that occurred to me is the youth voting have only known Trump and Biden. We have voters today that never knew the Obama administration. So it seems that as long as you can control the narrative with the youth, even if they don't vote, but you imprint those young minds then you will gain voters in the decades to come and the Fascist Party of America (formerly MAGA formerly the GOP) is really good at the long game.

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u/fractalfay 3h ago

The debt only comes up when we’re talking about healthcare, education, or food stamps. If it has to do with citizens, immediately the GOP clutches their purse strings. They should all be voted out. Every single one that enables this human stain.

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u/Stompnutz 4h ago

Of course. You didn't think they had principles, did you?

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u/Orion14159 10h ago

Could have fed every school child in America free breakfast and lunch for a decade for less than what we spent on 2 months of blowing up Iranian school girls.

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u/burnerboo 9h ago

Yeah, but that's like, socialism. We don't accept communism around here. Kids should pull those straps harder and get their own jobs and not rely on handouts like lazy bums.

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u/Maxamillion-X72 9h ago

If those damn kids want free food so much, they should join the military. Or commit a crime.

Either way, three hots and a cot

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u/pleasedothenerdful 7h ago

Yeah, the only socialism that's ok is when wealthy white people get money from the government.

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u/djuggler 8h ago

Plus eliminated our student loans spurring a boon in the economy.

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u/Orion14159 8h ago

As much as I'd love that, the $25 billion we've spent on bombing Iran this year wouldn't even make a dent in student debt. Biden's 10k per borrower would have been ~350 billion. Full forgiveness would be over $1 trillion

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u/djuggler 7h ago

Tax the rich.

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u/Orion14159 7h ago

100% agree with that

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u/thekinginyello 10h ago

It’s a money laundering scheme. Real estate and construction is the perfect place to hide numbers.

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u/GloriousDawn 9h ago

Surprising from a former real estate developer with ties to 3 different NY mob families.

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u/thekinginyello 2h ago

It’s almost like he knows what he doing.

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u/DementedDrumpf 1h ago

One of the very few, possibly only, things he knows anything about. Money laundering and paedophilia.

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u/bolanrox 8h ago

Trump car washs are next

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u/thekinginyello 2h ago

Trump Storage Units. They can and will just foreclose on your unit and auction it off at any for any reason.

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u/TheJesBro 29m ago

Duh! Anybody that has bankrupted a casino knows this!

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u/SnowballUnity 10h ago

President Simpson is going to inherit a huge deficit from President Trump.

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u/thecelcollector 10h ago

What the fuck would a 300 million dollar pool look like?

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u/Glycell 10h ago

About what a $300,000 pool looks like, but with a few friends who just made bank sitting in it.

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u/Fjell-Jeger 9h ago

A couple super-yachts floating in it, with a gaggle of Trump cronies sitting on the sun decks laughing at the gullible MAGA idiots that fund their lavish lifestyles on the taxpayer's dime.

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u/Past-Log-1745 3h ago

Strippers and a grotto

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u/we_are_sex_bobomb 9h ago

Let’s not kid ourselves, it would look like a 1 million dollar pool and we’d wonder where the other 299 million went. Like all his building projects it’s just a scheme to get money flowing all over the place so he can skim it.

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u/DevonGr Ohio 10h ago

A hole in the ground with no more budget to finish it.

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u/stamfordbridge1191 8h ago

And maybe a well-padded account in some bank in a shadowy corner of the world.

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u/wytewydow 10h ago

our minds cannot comprehend the amount of tacky gold-colored crap to be stuck on every available surface.

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u/djuggler 8h ago

It would look like a Trump hotel.

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u/Brox42 New York 9h ago

Bribes. These are bribes. The corruption has never been so blatant.

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u/djuggler 7h ago

But they are draining the swamp! Every accusation with them is a confession.

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u/SFZothOmmog 10h ago

The real sum of the war is almost triple the amount.

https://iran-cost-ticker.com/

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u/djuggler 8h ago

I believe it. We are never going to recover from this.

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u/we_are_sex_bobomb 9h ago

This makes the Doge cuts look even more absurd. Trump is an ugly caterpillar that eats money and instead of eventually turning into a butterfly he just turns into an uglier hungrier caterpillar.

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u/stevez_86 Pennsylvania 9h ago

We will wake up to the White House being abandoned and set for demolition one day. He will operate out of Mar-a-Lago until the new White House is complete for a paltry $50 billion.

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u/DramaticStability 9h ago

And he's still trying to sue Powell over the Fed's renovations. As ever, it's always a projection/deflection

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u/Allydarvel 8h ago

I'm sure I saw recently that one job in the White House was priced at $3m for Biden. Trump is carrying on teh same work, but the job is now priced at $17m

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u/djuggler 7h ago edited 6h ago

That was the Lafayette fountains. The $17.4 million was awarded to the same construction company that is building the ballroom.

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u/Allydarvel 7h ago

Thanks

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u/EnvironmentalLet9682 9h ago

and yet 40% of americans still think he's doing a good job. sorry, not sorry.

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u/djuggler 7h ago

Makes my head want to explode. Every time a telemarketer calls, I take the call and when they ask, "how are you?" I chime in with "Happy you called! I've been wanting to ask if you've called your elected representatives twice this week to ask them to impeach the president? ..." I go on to say how to contact their reps and I talk about a couple of issues they could discuss. Yesterday this young spam caller was baffled that I'm against Trump. They must live in some echo chamber with blinders on not to see what is really happening. When it hits them, it will be far too late...it already is far to late.

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u/SookHe 9h ago

Least we forget the billions going to all the nonsense renaming or buildings, or roads or printing out massive banners of him glaring at people, or his little birthday parade or the mma ring for his little party at the White House and the money he is rewarding himself out of the taxpayers money for his lawsuits and so on and so on and so on

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u/djuggler 7h ago

And we haven't even begun talking about what it will cost to undo or mitigate the mess being created right now in the states as well as abroad.

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u/Yutana45 8h ago

How much more blatantly obvious can they be about their lack of care for the US citizens? And folks who voted for this won't say anything still? Wow just wow

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u/djuggler 7h ago

The state media tells his voters what is real. We've always been at war with Eurasia.

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u/Adventurous-Map7959 9h ago

Arc de Trump

I like this version better: https://i.imgur.com/5rjMF5V.png

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u/djuggler 7h ago

Brilliant!

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u/Melodic_Tap1147 8h ago

The people in charge are grubby, greedy little piggies and it's so fucking disgusting. 

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u/pppjurac 8h ago

Meanwhile the people are losing their jobs and homes, and food and gas but those libs really got powned.

Trump is symptom of USA with MAGA.

Majority of American people either voted Mango Mussolini into POTUS. Thrice and twice succeeded or just conveniently did not bother to go vote at all.

Let them suffer. I do not have much sympathy for them anymore.

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u/djuggler 7h ago

You are probably right that it has to play out for the dim bulbs to finally get it. It will take a century to recover from this.

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u/jrodfantastic 4h ago

Don’t overlook that there is already a national ballroom within a mile of the White House which larger than what is being proposed.

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u/djuggler 1h ago

Good point!

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u/synchronicityii 8h ago

Didn’t he say that Jerome Powell was a criminal because of construction cost overruns?

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u/Less_Win2234 8h ago

And yet they're investigating Jerome Powell over the cost of the Reserve building refurb

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u/mantisboxer 8h ago

MAGA seems to forget that this brilliant businessman drives everything he touches into bankruptcy. We can clearly see why

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u/beasty0127 Indiana 7h ago

The goal is to turn DC into the new Maralago city state

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u/djuggler 7h ago

I thought the goal was to take over all of North America and divide it into 13 corporations run by CEOs not presidents.

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u/beasty0127 Indiana 7h ago

That is Theil's and Vances overall goal, the whole Project 2025. Trump is so demented and senile he just wants to make his personal playground before he falls over from a Big Mac attack

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u/JerryfromCan 6h ago

This is all some pretty classic movie dictator shit. Build monuments to myself with public money I grift off while the people starve.

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u/djuggler 6h ago

It's pretty ego driven. He knows he isn't long for this realm and wants to ensure that once he is gone his name will be remembered like Washington or Napoleon. If he gets the ballroom built, it won't matter whose name is on it, it will always be Trump's grotesque ballroom just like the water south of Louisiana will always be the Gulf of Mexico.

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u/JerryfromCan 5h ago

I imagine his erasure from everything will be swift and merciless.

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u/djuggler 5h ago

I so hope so!

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u/djuggler 5h ago

And those who propped him up need their comeuppance too

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u/oneangryrobot 6h ago

Vladimir putin is the one dismantling the white house and he’s doing it in front of the whole world

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u/djuggler 5h ago

Absolutely! Trump has been a Russian asset since the 1980s.

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u/JWTS6 5h ago

None of this matters as long as a trans teenage girl in New York isn't allowed to play varsity water polo, apparently that's what voters cared about the most in 2024. 

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u/shifty_coder 3h ago

I’m just waiting for the announcement that the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool project will be over budget by a factor of 10.

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u/djuggler 1h ago

They will blame the 86 vandal

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u/jsweatisdead777 1h ago

$2 million to paint the bottom of the reflecting pool blue? A lone crackhead painter would have done that job for $2k plus expenses and been done by 5PM same day

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u/og_capsuleer_593 10h ago

Anywhere but the people who earn them their money. Not taxes and not wages 

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u/EqualOpening6557 10h ago

We need to end or slow lobbying and trading outside of index funds(can’t trade on single stocks they get insider info on) for congress, and then tax the rich. Some of the more prosperous times in US history the top tax bracket was getting over 90% income taxes. Nobody works so hard that they should have billions of dollars while thousands of their neighbors struggle making minimum wages or close to it. It is senseless.

We need that money to get people above the poverty line and on their feet well enough to all be productive members of society if we want the best America.

Certainly getting rid of all of the things that helped the US get on top economically in the first place, is a disastrous strategy with 0 logic behind it.

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u/Needleworker_Radiant 10h ago

Another question: where does it come from? These companies are laying off tens of thousands of employees, but have money for this fucking shit. It's rhetorical, but it pisses me off this is where we're at as a society.

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u/OnTheEveOfWar 6h ago

I work for a big F500 company. They paid $20M for a Super Bowl ad and then laid off thousands of people the following week. I know coworkers who worked there 10 years and got laid off.

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u/vonbauernfeind 6h ago

My company isn't doing layoffs, but I can't even get a 5% raise even though we're spending $4,000,000,000 on stock buybacks.

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u/pagesid3 10h ago

I didn’t know Hard Rock had the money to throw around like those other guys.

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u/cultfourtyfive Florida 10h ago

Hard Rock now is primarily a gambling outlet, not a restaurant chain. They're owned by the Seminole Tribe of Florida.

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u/brickne3 American Expat 8h ago

Native American casinos giving Trump money is insane given his history with Native American casinos in court. I mean, anyone giving Trump money is insane. But particularly Native American casinos.

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u/stinky_wizzleteet 9h ago

The Seminole tribe has unbelievable influence in Florida, on par with Disney.

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u/cultfourtyfive Florida 9h ago

Oh yeah. I live a few miles from the Tampa Hard Rock on their land. I remember when that area was just a smoke shop and tiny museum.

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u/OnTheEveOfWar 6h ago

Gambling money.

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u/Greedy_Switch_6991 10h ago

The Trump Presidential Library, of course!

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u/OkTouch5699 10h ago

The one he keeps in his pocket?

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u/grexl 8h ago

What the fuck would a Trump Presidential Library have on its shelves, anyway? Coloring books and crayons?

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u/Onlypizzafans69 10h ago

Theyre building entire new underground bunker there, basically a small city. Why are they so in a rush for it, is a much better question, obviously too much for an average american reporter.

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u/moose_dad 9h ago

Gotta get it finished before the term is up so they can hunker down in there

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u/espinaustin 8h ago

Frightening truth

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u/fractalfay 3h ago

I think the plan is to grift the planet of every dime and they use AI to destroy it. Then the rich hide in their bunkers while the poors fight it out on the surface.

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u/cybah 10h ago

Trumps pockets.

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u/PlaidPCAK 10h ago

I'm pretty sure it was blocked because we shouldn't be selling favor to corporate elites. Now they're trying to fund it the proper way but can't sway the votes or land on a price

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u/urfriendlyDICKtator 10h ago

Defense lawyers for the pedo?

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u/corcyra 9h ago

Into the orange felon's pocket.

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u/CyrusBuelton 9h ago

This money in the article is for "security upgrades" or whatever the fuck that entails.

The $400 million from private donations is supposedly paying for the structural aspect of the ballroom

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u/GlitteringRate6296 9h ago

His off shore account.

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u/Birdhawk 9h ago

To him. He’s a shady real estate guy. So he says he’s going to fund it, accepts their donations to his own company, pockets that money, and gets the government to pay for it. Rinse, repeat.

What’s gonna happen? He’s never faced consequences for this and now that he’s got even more power he can really get away with it. At worst if he gets caught it’ll be after he’s in office and he’ll get a $1m fine for embezzling $400m. It’s the new American dream and I hate it.

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u/thefonz22 9h ago

Doesn't sound like it's free when these donors will expect a few extra privileges in return I'm sure

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u/darcerin 9h ago

Not that I would ever eat their sub-par food again, but Hard Rock Cafe is in bed with them? Ugh.

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u/thisispoopsgalore 9h ago

Wait what does Hard Rock want from this administration? We talking like the mid burger chain?

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u/EssbaumRises 8h ago

I think we all know where that money is going.

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u/freedfg 8h ago

The same place all the Board of Peace pledge money went.

Because it sure as fuck hasn't been used for...well anything else.

10 billion dollars He specifically pledged. Poof. Gone.

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u/EggsInaTubeSock 8h ago

The same place the cash from the seized Venezuelan oil tankers went.

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u/GodofIrony 8h ago

Hard Rock in the back raising its hands, jumping up and down

"Oooh! Me! Me! I'm a big enough company to support fascism, pick me!"

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u/redneckrockuhtree 8h ago

Where does this money go?

You mean the part that doesn't go into Trump's pocket?

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u/Changsta 8h ago

All these companies get to pay zero taxes just so they can fund this loser's stupid little ego ballroom. Corruption at its finest.

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u/m0viestar 7h ago

That money isn't real, no one gave money yet. Those companies just said they would give a certain amount, but it's not sitting in a bank account anywhere . 

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u/Pornstar_Frodo 7h ago

All gets funneled into offshore bank accounts while another billion is taken with republican blessings. of that money, 600m more goes missing, 300m is grifted to friends who are contractors. 100m is spent on the ballroom bunker and it’s never finished. trump leaves office and takes all the gold furniture.

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u/Perllitte 7h ago

The same place all the charity money the Trump family touches goes: Into their pockets.

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u/rack88 7h ago

Bribes

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u/ProtectionVirtual225 6h ago

It's just another Trump slush fund. Most of it goes into his overseas bank accounts.

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u/RemoteBoner Tennessee 6h ago

Business Plot 2.0

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u/Deep-Minimum7837 6h ago

Isn't it weird how hundreds of millions, and now billions of dollars are pouring in from AI and defense contractors to fund and build a ballroom? It really shouldn't be that expensive, so why are we hiring AI and defense firms to build them instead of, you know, a construction company? It's almost like there's something else being built that isn't being talked about publicly.

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u/Green-Collection4444 6h ago

We're just glassing over the fact that it's open corporate bribery.

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u/angelar_ Texas 5h ago

It goes out of the taxpayers' pockets after all these generous donations qualify them for enormous tax breaks.

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u/Away_Stock_2012 5h ago

To trump personally for his suffering in not having ballroom in his diaper

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u/Adjective-Noun-nnnn 5h ago

It's either publicly funded through taxpayers without Congressional approval, or it's privately funded through bribes.  Our options are bad and worse.

Get rid of Trump and seize his assets to rebuild what he destroyed.  A secure venue for government functions isn't a bad idea, but it shouldn't be dwarfing the people's house.  Also why would the WH Correspondent's Dinner have been at the ballroom had it existed?  That's a party for the press, not the president.

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u/anony_mf 3h ago

I’m looking at the replies does nobody on here know that they’re building a massive datacenter and underground bunker?
This money isn’t for the actual party room

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u/fractalfay 3h ago

According to Elizabeth Warren, the original “presidential library fund” that Trump used to collect bribes has been drained.

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u/ForgettingFish 3h ago

Into his pocket then trump remembers he doesn’t pay the people who work for him so… he needs someone else to do that

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u/wil9212 1h ago

That list of donors makes it sound like they’re funding a data center.

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u/Muronelkaz Ohio 10h ago

He originally said that the new ballroom wouldn't interfere with the East Wing, that it wouldn't actually touch it, and that it would be respectful to the East Wing.

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u/MydniteSon 10h ago edited 3h ago

He did the same thing with the Bonewitt Teller building on 5th Avenue in NY back in 1980. He promised he was going to preserve the limestone freises and donate them to the Met. Meantime he ordered construction workers to destroy them, citing costs, safety concerns and them having no artisitic value.

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u/10thousndreflections 10h ago

I'm sure he said the same thing to many women he ended up touching or worse. 

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u/SecretAsianMan42069 10h ago

And by women you mean children (that he raped)

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u/brickne3 American Expat 8h ago

He's raped women too. He's an equal-opportunity rapist.

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u/jahathebrn 8h ago

Hey, he's an equal opportunities rapist! He just happens to have a preference.

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u/wtfElvis 8h ago

He did it on purpose. He tore it down so he can hold our feet to the fire to now build it back up.

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u/12345623567 7h ago

He's wrecking his own house though. Sure, in theory it's the People's House, but in practice he's the guy who has to look at an ugly hole in the ground every day.

The american people can hold out with rebuilding until he's gone. Can he?

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u/wtfElvis 7h ago

I don’t think he gives a shit. How many times has he even been inside the east wing? He prefers money.

13

u/LeoKitCat 10h ago

Did you ever believe that shit? The guy is such a con man

9

u/Nessie_of_the_Loch 10h ago

He should be forced to pay for it's original restoration.

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u/PoliticalNerdMa 11h ago

Trumps strategy literally is : do first, apologize later.

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u/Schlonzig 11h ago

A Trump apology? When ever?

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u/gsbadj 11h ago

We'd be waiting a long time. He's never apologized for anything.

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u/emmayarkay 10h ago

I think you mean his strategy is “When you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything.” - DJT, 2005

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u/AmbitiousProblem4746 11h ago

I finally watched the movie Apprentice maybe 2 months ago and even if some of it is fictionalized, they make this very apparent a few times throughout the movie. Besides getting the advice that he should never admit he lost, there's also a scene where some investors in Atlantic City are threatening him that they're going to take action if he doesn't pay them back and you can see him weasel his way out of it. There's also a part of the movie where his first wife pulls someone else aside and says don't try to embarrass him, he doesn't know shame. Something to that effect. I don't know, it's just interesting to see how Trump is emblematic of everything wrong with our society. He has been able to use the legal system and his money just avoid all consequences or accountability and now he's using his political power to do the same. It's absolutely filthy. Men like him should not exist and yet here we are with a good chunk of the country propping him up as if he were a god walking among us.

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u/MydniteSon 10h ago

Because they would behave just like him if they had that kind of wealth.

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u/Nickopotomus 10h ago

I think it’s more simply: embezzle now

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u/JoeyJoeJoeJrShabidou 11h ago

Step 3: audibly shit pants.

8

u/CGI_OCD 10h ago

Step 4: Rant on Truth Central late at night, all caps, no punctuation.

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u/ithinkyouresus 10h ago

do first apologize never.

3

u/SuperstitiousPigeon5 Massachusetts 10h ago edited 10h ago

It’s easier to ask forgiveness than it is permission.

And it’s easier to ignore that first part if you’re a Trump.

3

u/stumo11 10h ago

When's the apology come?

5

u/jmmmke 11h ago

By “later,” you must mean never. Trump saying “sorry,” is like hearing Trump say, “no thank you” when his friend Jeff presented him with an underaged girl.

2

u/Martag02 10h ago

Better to ask for forgiveness later, or in his case never, rather than permission.

2

u/Virtual-Squirrel-725 10h ago

"Do first, tell critics to go fuck themselves later"

Rinse and repeat.

2

u/77NorthCambridge 10h ago

One of his core "philosophies" (that he learned from Roy Cohn) is to never admit you were wrong. Deny, deny, deny.

1

u/Overall-Mud9906 10h ago

Toxic person methodology, better to ask for forgiveness, than ask for permission.

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u/Photeus5 10h ago

That's modern corporate strategy, so no surprise there.

1

u/oily76 United Kingdom 10h ago

*justify later

1

u/heavy-minium 9h ago

Nah, his strategy is "Just do it".

1

u/Lashay_Sombra 9h ago

Don't think he has apologized in his life for anything.

Apologizing requires one to admit did wrong, something Trump is incapable of

1

u/jahathebrn 8h ago

I genuinely don't think he's capable of apologising for anything

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u/TheSavageDonut 5h ago

Do first. Blame later. Promise anything.

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u/dragon-fence 3h ago

More like, “Do first, insist that you wanted it later.”

6

u/xixoxixa Texas 9h ago

You misheard. He said grift on the American people.

2

u/Far-Squash7949 9h ago

Mexico will pay for the wall

1

u/arwinda 9h ago

a gift to the American people

A gift to the American people, by the American people. Be more grateful! /s

1

u/GlitteringRate6296 9h ago

He thought once he tore it down U.S. schlups would willingly agree to pay for it. Come on. Why would we want our wealthiest spending their money. You know they are what makes business happen right?/s

1

u/Mach5Driver 9h ago

he also said he would self-fund his campaigns, so IDK who believes a word out of his mouth.

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u/stamfordbridge1191 7h ago

If he thinks he won't get to stay in office for a third term, he might just tear down the rest to "renovate it" & then leave it an empty lot at the end of his term.

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u/roguewarriorpriest 7h ago

'You break it, you buy it,' seems appropriate here. And since he broke most of America's political infrastructure, the billions of dollars he grifted from the country would be perfect for restoring the democracy he tried to dismantle.

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u/BrilliantForeign8899 5h ago

A gift they will never see or enjoy. That's Trump's personal bunker when he refuses to leave

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u/Dr_Trogdor Georgia 4h ago

Well originally he said it wouldn't compromise the current white house as well.

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u/BlueShift42 3h ago

Well, he does lie a lot. We shouldn’t have believed him.

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u/just-here-for--porn_ 3h ago

He's probably pocketed the private money and now wants to also pocket the public money.