Trump Demolishes Part of White House as He Builds His Tacky Ballroom

President Donald Trump said his new 90,000-square-foot White House ballroom “won’t interfere with the current building.” But footage from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue on Monday afternoon shows a crew tearing down the facade of the East Wing to make way for the garish structure.

An image obtained by The Washington Post shows a construction machine dismantling the side of the East Wing, which was added in 1942. Collapsed walls can be seen in the photograph, as can exposed rebar, with windows lying in a pile of debris on the ground.

As McClatchy White House correspondent Emily Goodin reported on X: “Bulldozers are taking down the façade and parts of the roof now. Windows have been removed. Trees were seen being taken from the property,” and the “area is fenced off and closed to staff.”

Asked in July about the possibility of East Wing demolition for the ballroom’s construction, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt answered, quite vaguely, that the wing would “be modernized” and “the necessary construction will take place.” Leavitt also said East Wing offices—including that of the first lady, the White House Military Office, and the visitors office—would be “temporarily relocated” while it is “being modernized.”

Observers online were shocked by this manifestation of Trump’s apparent belief that, as president, he owns “the People’s House”—to say nothing of other American institutions he’s sought to reshape (most in a less physical sense) to his liking.

“So any president can just start destroying portions of the White House? Is that how this works?” wrote Jim Acosta, independent journalist and former CNN White House correspondent, on X.

“Okay come on guys,” Gregg Carlstrom of The Economist quipped, “isn’t Trump taking a literal backhoe to the White House just a little heavy-handed as a metaphor?”

The White House press secretary is finding a lot of humor in international discord.

Karoline Leavitt doubled down Monday on a remarkably perverse response she gave a HuffPost reporter who inquired why the White House had chosen Budapest as the location for forthcoming ceasefire negotiations between Russia and Ukraine.

In a concise text exchange, Huffpost’s S.V. Dáte underscored the historical significance of the city as it relates to Ukraine-Russia relations, asking: “Who suggested Budapest?”

Leavitt had a three-word answer: “Your mom did.”

Fascinatingly, Leavitt seemed to believe that sharing the larger text exchange with her X followers would win her some public grace. Her continued response to Dáte, when pressed to explain whether she thought the situation was funny, reads as follows:

“It’s funny to me that you actually consider yourself a journal,” Leavitt said, according to a screenshot she posted to her social media. “You are a far left hack who nobody takes seriously, including your colleagues in the media, they just don’t tell you that to your face. Stop texting me your disingenuous, biased, and bullshit questions.”

In her caption, Leavitt suggested that Dáte should not be addressed or conversed with as a legitimate member of the press on the basis that she believed his social media feeds amount to an “anti-Trump personal diary.”

“Activists who masquerade as real reporters do a disservice to the profession,” the 28-year-old press secretary—who has never held down a full-time job in the media industry—wrote on X.

Whether or not the Trump administration is taking the proceedings seriously, the location choice will not be lost on Russia and Ukraine’s leadership. In 1994, Budapest was chosen as the site in which America and the U.K. agreed to defend Ukraine’s borders in exchange for its surrender of nuclear weapons.

Thirty-one years later, it appears that the Budapest Memorandum has not worked out well for Ukraine. During a White House meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy on Friday, Donald Trump reportedly tossed Zelenskiy’s maps of the battlefield in the air while insisting that the foreign leader cede portions of Ukraine-controlled eastern Donbas to Russia.

European governments rushed to Zelenskiy’s defense, alarmed by Trump’s trust that Russian President Vladimir Putin would end his assault on Ukraine after claiming some portions of the country for Russia.

“We see President Trump’s efforts to bring peace to Ukraine, all these efforts are welcome but we don’t see Russia wanting peace,” Kaja Kallas, the EU’s top diplomat, told the Financial Times on Monday. “We are discussing what more we can do.”

The European Commission suggested over the weekend that Ukraine could use a $163 billion reparations loan, bankrolled by frozen Russian assets, to buy arms abroad in their ongoing fight.

The government’s nuclear watchdog agency is poised to be understaffed, as Politico reports the Trump administration has placed about 80 percent of its personnel on furlough amid the ongoing government shutdown.

The National Nuclear Security Administration is a semiautonomous agency within the Department of Energy that maintains the U.S. nuclear stockpile, responds to nuclear emergencies domestically and abroad, and works to prevent nuclear proliferation globally. The NNSA’s staff of fewer than 2,000 workers oversees about 60,000 contractors.

On Monday morning, the administration sent out furlough notices to about 1,400 employees, Politico reports, leaving just 375 staff members on the job for the time being. This is an unprecedented action in the agency’s 25-year history.

Last week, when the then-impending cuts were first reported, Energy Secretary Chris Wright called the workers “critical to modernizing our nuclear arsenal.”

This is just the latest controversial NNSA staffing news to come out of the second Trump administration. The agency previously faced scrutiny for terminating hundreds of workers at the behest of President Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency, before scrambling to rehire some of them as Wright confessed he’d “made mistakes” and moved “a little too quickly.”

Republican Representative Chip Roy took some time on Monday to remind Americans that his party still has no regard for the separation of church and state, something the Founding Fathers they love to praise cared deeply about.

“The truth is, the Marxists, the radicals, and the Islamists the Democratic Party promoted this weekend, they cannot handle the truth,” Roy said, referring to the widespread No Kings protests on Saturday. “And the truth is that there is a king, and that king is Jesus. And the president has been willing to say it. His administration has been willing to say it. And Charlie Kirk was willing to say it, and he got killed for it.”

Roy sounds like a crazed individual who has not read much of the Bible or the U.S. Constitution. And he seriously misrepresents the makeup of the No Kings protests in the process, sticking to the party script of it being a haven for antifa-loving Communists rather than a very peaceful gathering of Americans closer to the political middle of this country.

We are not a theocracy; Jesus Christ is not the king of America. There is an entire clause in the First Amendment aimed at curtailing the very speech Roy put forth on Monday. As Thomas Jefferson put it: “I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should ‘make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,’ thus building a wall of separation between Church & State.”

Roy and his fellow Republicans may be too deep in their religious psychosis to take heed.

President Donald Trump flailed Monday while walking back his support for Ukraine.

During a press conference, Trump was asked about a comment he made last month suggesting that Ukraine could “win” the war against Russia and claim all of the territory seized by Russia. At the time, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy hailed the position as a “big shift” from his American ally. 

But on Monday, it seemed that the U.S. president had shifted back.

“Well, they could. They could still win it. I don’t think they will. But they could still win it. I never said they would win it, I said they could—anything can happen, you know, war is a very strange thing, a lot of bad things happen, a lot of good things happen,” Trump replied.  

So basically, it’s anyone’s game. It seems clear that Trump’s nonstatements, which are able to flip-flop despite not expressing any real position, demonstrate just how little grip the president actually has on the situation in Ukraine. 

Trump even lashed out at one journalist when she asked what was really stopping him from actually helping Ukraine. 

“You’re the most powerful man on earth, why don’t you just enable Ukraine to finish this war tomorrow?” the reporter asked. 

“Well, if you knew anything about what you were talking about—” Trump started. 

“I do,” she replied. 

“You do? I don’t think you do, really. I don’t think you do because it’s a little bit more complicated than that,” Trump said. 

Last week, Zelenskiy left the White House disappointed after Trump reneged on an offer to supply Tomahawk missiles to the embattled country, following a lengthy phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Trump reportedly had a fit during the meeting, cursing at Zelenskiy and throwing his maps of the battlefield.

“Peace in the Middle East” may be almost over.

Even Donald Trump recognized the fragility of the ceasefire arrangement between Israel and Palestine Monday, mentioning during a meeting with Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese that his administration was currently grappling with a “little situation” in the region.

“We have a little situation, relatively, with Hamas, and that will be taken care of very quickly if they don’t straighten it out themselves,” Trump told reporters Monday. “Because they’re in violation of their agreement.”

Israel violated the ceasefire deal over the weekend when it launched a wave of airstrikes at the Gaza Strip, killing dozens of people, including children. The bodies of 57 Palestinians had been brought to hospitals across the region over the last 24 hours, reported Al Jazeera.

Israel claimed that its attack was precipitated by Hamas’s own violation of the peace deal. The Israeli military announced, early Sunday Eastern time, that “terrorists” in the Rafah area had fired guns and an anti-tank missile at IDF forces.

Hamas responded that it was not responsible for the attacks and that it was committed to the terms of the peace deal, but Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu nonetheless directed that “strong action” be taken against “terrorist targets in the Gaza Strip.”

Netanyahu met with U.S. envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner Monday to discuss the situation. Vice President JD Vance, who may travel to Israel later this week, suggested Sunday that the ceasefire arrangement had not been seriously tested.

“There’s going to be fits and starts,” Vance told reporters Sunday.

By Monday around noon Eastern time, the Israeli military had launched an artillery attack in Deir El Balah, according to Al Jazeera.

Last month, a United Nations commission formally determined that Israel’s assault on the Gaza Strip is a genocide.

Over nearly 24 months of fighting, Israel has cut off access to water, electricity, medical services, and food in the region, all under the banner of rooting out Hamas soldiers, forcing millions of people into mass suffering to satisfy their war. For decades, Israel has trimmed away and confiscated Palestinian land, claiming it for its own illegal settlements—a feat that wouldn’t have been possible without the financial support of the United States.

As an estimated seven million people across 2,700 municipalities peacefully demonstrated against the Trump administration at No Kings events Saturday, reports of violence have thus far been scant—except for some instances in which apparent MAGA agitators targeted the pro-democracy protesters.

One notable incident came out of Jackson Township, Ohio, where a No Kings participant’s leg was injured in a hit-and-run. Witnesses told local outlets that a man driving a white pickup truck deliberately veered onto grass where protesters were seated, hitting a 53-year-old woman, before speeding off.

“It was definitely on purpose,” said one witness in The Canton Repository. “He went up on the curb. She took a direct hit. It could have been a lot worse. She put her fist in the air and said ‘I’m all right,’ but I think she might have broken her leg.”

“He drove up the curb trying to scare us, and we all jumped back,” another witness told an independent local reporter. “Unfortunately, a woman standing close to me was hit.”

The protest continued, and local authorities are reportedly investigating the incident.

In Kent, Ohio—a 40-minute drive from Jackson Township—an alleged Trump supporter was arrested by local police after reportedly shoving a woman.

The man was initially seized by a local city councilman, Jeff Clapper, and a group of other No Kings protesters who had witnessed the incident and heard the man was in possession of a firearm.

On social media, a Kent resident, who captured a photo of the man being held down, called him “a belligerent Trump agitator.” Clapper told the Akron Beacon Journal that he heard the individual was a Trump supporter but emphasized that politics had “no bearing” on his actions, which were simply a reaction to seeing somebody “push a woman.”

At a No Kings event in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, a man in a Jeep adorned with Trump flags reportedly brandished a firearm at protesters. He was subsequently taken into custody by local police.*

So, while Republican lawmakers spent the days leading up to No Kings fearmongering about the protesters themselves, early reports show that MAGA troublemakers were responsible for rare instances of violence on the mass day of protest.

* This story originally misstated the state Wilkes-Barre is located in.

Speaker Mike Johnson justified President Trump’s disgusting AI video of him dumping feces on No Kings protesters by falsely claiming that the protesters were calling for political murder.

“Speaker Johnson, you say that the Democrats had a ‘Hate America’ rally, but what does it say that the president of the United States over the weekend released a video of him pooping on the American people?” The Independent’s Eric Garcia asked Johnson at his Monday press conference.

Johnson chuckled. “The president uses social media to make a point. You can argue he’s probably the most effective person who’s ever used social media for that. He is using satire to make a point,” Johnson replied. “He is not calling for the murder of his political opponents, and that’s what these people are doing.”

What the GOP claims was a “Hate America” rally was incredibly peaceful, as attendees and organizers alike made a point to denounce political violence of any kind. In the days leading up to the event, Johnson accused the event of being a haven for “pro-Hamas supporters,” “antifa types,” and “Marxists,” while House Majority Whip Tom Emmer went one step further and called it an event for the “terrorist wing” of the Democratic Party. And if Johnson’s comments on Monday are any proof, Republicans are still staunchly committed to pushing those lies.

“The politics, the spectacle, is what the mobs, the crowds, the rallies this week were all about,” Johnson continued. “The irony was very glaring. They called it the ‘No Kings’ rally. But the great irony of course … if President Trump was a king, the government would be open. If President Trump was a king, he would’ve closed the nationals parks and the National Mall so they couldn’t have had the rally out here.”

What exactly does Johnson think millions of people across America were doing on Saturday? That they were all paid by George Soros to be there? That they’re all just crazed Marxists who don’t know how good they have it under Trump? This is yet another example of Republicans trying to convince their voters, themselves, and anyone who listens that everything is fine, and that Trump isn’t wildly overreaching in his executive power as he continues to send the military into American cities while siccing his secret police on anyone he doesn’t like. But in Johnson’s eyes, it’s the people that are crazy, not him.

President Donald Trump’s administration is moving to suspend all Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits for roughly 42 million Americans amid the ongoing government shutdown—and he may not bring them back.

Earlier this month, the U.S. Department of Agriculture sent a letter to states warning that a lapse in appropriations had resulted in “insufficient funds” to pay SNAP benefits through November. Over the weekend, states began to issue warnings to their most vulnerable residents that benefits would be suspended even sooner, Axios reported Monday.

In West Virginia, the Department of Human Services released a statement saying that the USDA had directed it to “delay the issuance of October 2025 SNAP benefits approved on or after October 16, 2025.”

The state had been notified that it was “very likely” that November benefits would also be delayed, if Congress failed to act “within the coming days,” the statement said.

In Pennsylvania, the Department of Human Services announced Friday that SNAP benefits would not be paid starting October 16 “until the federal government shutdown ends and funds are released to PA.”

“Because Republicans in Washington D.C., failed to pass a federal budget, causing the federal government shutdown, November 2025 SNAP benefits cannot be paid,” Pennsylvania’s statement said.

Texas, Minnesota, and Illinois also issued warnings about the pending halt to SNAP, Axios reported.

Amid his cost-cutting spree, Trump has moved to hold critical nutrition assistance hostage—and like every other federal program he’s threatened, SNAP is a hostage he’s more than happy to kill. Last week, Trump said that he planned to cut some “Democrat programs” and warned that they were “never going to come back in many cases.”

As with every other federal program Trump’s moved to permanently eliminate, he is not authorized to do so, because SNAP was created and funded by Congress. But that certainly hasn’t stopped him before.

The USDA is already rushing to implement new restrictions to SNAP benefits, as outlined in Trump’s “one big beautiful bill,” which was passed in July. Trump’s behemoth budget law slashed exemptions to the program’s work requirements by lowering the age of dependent children to 14, raising the age of the work requirement to 64, and ending the exemptions for veterans, homeless people, and young adults out of foster care. Earlier this month, USDA instructed states to implement new guidelines by November 1.

Millions of Americans exercised their First Amendment rights on Saturday, turning out in the largest single-day protest in U.S. history to reject Donald Trump’s monarch-like grip on the federal government. But some leaders in Washington were unimpressed by the enormous display of dissent.

Speaking with reporters Monday morning, House Speaker Mike Johnson condemned the rhetoric of the protests, falsely claiming that the No Kings protesters advocate for violence against political officials.

“Congratulations, they didn’t burn any buildings down. That’s a big achievement for the left, to have some kind of gathering where they don’t have looting and rioting and burn a building down,” Johnson said.

By and large, the multi-month protest series has advocated for Americans’ First Amendment rights and rejected Trump’s agenda. Signage related to the event has emphasized the fight for democracy and against dictatorships. In the same political vein, No Kings participants have used their enormous visual footprint to fight against ICE’s unchecked authority, turn out for universal health care, condemn the release of disgraced former Representative George Santos, and raise national awareness to the rise of American fascism.

Somewhere between five and eight million people participated in the nationwide protest over the weekend, and it was remarkably peaceful. Organizers said that more than 2,500 individual events had been planned across the country for Saturday. Despite premature mobilizations of the National Guard in red states such as Virginia and Texas, there was no violence.

As evidence: One of the nation’s largest gatherings in New York City, which amassed some 100,000 people, according to estimates, resulted in zero protest-related arrests by the New York City Police Department.

Still, Republican leadership interpreted the event as an all out assault on the president’s life.

“Over and over again, you could see signs like ‘86-47,’” said House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, referring to an old restaurant term that means to nix an item off the menu. “I think everybody knows what that’s about. Multiple signs like that, advocating for the death of our president.”

Johnson was similarly unwilling to celebrate or even highlight the crowd control achievement. Instead, he fired paltry rhetorical shots at Portland, which has seen anti-ICE protesters dance and dress up in inflatable frog costumes since Trump directed the National Guard to the hipster paradise.

House Majority Whip Tom Emmer was even more vocal about his party’s contempt for the anti-Trump demonstration. Speaking at the same conference, Emmer falsely claimed that protests were the fruit of an alliance between establishment Democrats and domestic terrorists.

“It’s pure partisan politics in a desperate attempt to score points with the radical, pro-terrorist wing of their party,” Emmer said. “Now that their Hate America Rally is over, I hope that at least five Senate Democrats will finally do the right and responsible thing by breaking ranks with Chuck Schumer, passing our clean C.R., and reopening the government.”

Meanwhile, political violence has proved to be a phenomenon that persists in and defies both major parties, failing to fall neatly into a convenient, sellable narrative that can be repackaged for voters or donors. In truth, recent spikes in political violence have harmed both public figures (Charlie Kirk, Melissa Hortman) and regular Americans alike.

The only common denominator amongst all recent political violence is wide public access to guns, a detail that sets the U.S. far apart from the rest of the developed world.