Trump’s Ridiculous Ballroom Just Got Even More Expensive

The price tag on the White House ballroom just keeps climbing.

Speaking at a Hanukkah reception at the White House Tuesday night, Donald Trump nonchalantly dropped that the cost of building the 90,000-square-foot dance pad had grown to $400 million.

“I think it’ll be the greatest ballroom anywhere in the world,” Trump said. “Who else but in our country would sue to stop a $400 million beautiful ballroom that people have been after for the White House?

“The White House has wanted a ballroom for 150 years,” he added.

But exactly who has been clamoring for the facility—which will dwarf the 55,000-square-foot mansion—is not clear. Even the architect of the project, James McCrery II, disagreed with the size and scope of Trump’s ginormous ballroom, claiming that its construction would violate basic architectural principles. But McCrery’s opinion eventually got him fired.

The project’s price tag has seemingly grown by 100 percent since Trump first pitched it in July. The original $200 million cost became $300 million in October, as soon as Trump started tearing into the White House East Wing. The historic wing has been completely razed in the process, despite the president’s initial promises to build the addition “near but not touching” the actual White House.

Since Trump’s other promises have fallen flat, there seems to be no guarantee that the cost of the development will actually be funded “100 percent” by Trump and “some friends” of his.

The White House suggested that the project would be paid for, in part, by some of the country’s wealthiest families and biggest corporations, including the likes of Apple, Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and Meta.

Some major players in the defense industry with massive federal contracts have also pledged significant cash to develop the ballroom, including Lockheed Martin and Palantir.

Donald Trump bragged about one of his biggest donors, Miriam Adelson, donating $250 million to his campaign in 2024, at a White House Hanukkah event Tuesday night. Adelson then told the audience that Trump could run for a third term and whispered something in Trump’s ear. Trump smiled widely as he announced she’d offer him another $250 million.

Adelson, a staunch supporter of right-wing Israeli causes, said that a third term, which is unconstitutional, was possible for Trump with the help of disgraced attorney and Israel supporter Alan Dershowitz, who is implicated in the Jeffrey Epstein files.

“Miriam gave my campaign, indirectly and directly, 250 million, she was number one,” Trump told the crowd. “When somebody can give you 250 million, I think that we should give her the opportunity to say hello. And Miriam, make it quick, because 250 million is not what it used to be.”

Adelson then came to the stage and told the crowd about how she had recently “met Alan Dershowitz, and he said the legal thing about four more years.”

“And I say, Alan, I agree with you. So, we can do it. Think about it,” Adelson said. Trump pointed out that Dershowitz was in the crowd as the audience started to chant, “Four more years.”

The whole thing raises numerous issues, like the influence that rich donors have on the president and the open declaration of plans to flout the Constitution to keep Trump in office beyond 2028. Adelson’s money doesn’t come without strings, either: Just like in 2024, the billionaire widow of casino magnate Sheldon Adelson will likely push for the United States to recognize Israel’s annexation of the West Bank.

Last year, Trump told pro-Israel donors including Adelson that he would set back the pro-Palestinian movement by “25 or 30 years,” and so far, it seems that at least Adelson is happy with the job Trump is doing. Meanwhile, more than 70,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israel in the last two years, including over 379 casualties two months after a ceasefire in Gaza was declared. But at least Trump will get paid to stay in office illegally, right?

White House chief of staff Susie Wiles may have just ruined any chance President Donald Trump had of reviving his administration’s indictment of New York Attorney General Letitia James.

In a wildly candid interview with Vanity Fair published Tuesday, Wiles admitted that Trump’s effort to go after James over flimsy charges of mortgage fraud was his “one retribution.” (He has arguably had far more than one.)

Wiles explained that she hadn’t felt compelled to warn Trump off of James because “she had a half a billion dollars of his money.”

If the Trump administration ever wanted to seek an indictment against James again, it’s more than likely that the opposing legal team would simply have to cite Wiles to get the case tossed out again.

The Justice Department has tried three times to indict James—unsuccessfully in each instance, including one failed attempt as recent as last week. The original indictment against James was dismissed last month when a judge ruled that the Trump administration had improperly appointed the lead attorney, who had no prosecutorial experience at all.

Wiles was quick to claim that many of her quotes were taken out of context, but she’s already been caught lying about what she did and did not say. Multiple members of Trumpworld have voiced support for Wiles in the face of supposedly fake news. Meanwhile, Trump actually confirmed Wiles’s own wild comment about him.

Minnesota Republican Representative Tom Emmer was asked directly if he agreed with President Trump’s assessment that the thousands of Somali residents he represents are “garbage.” He couldn’t give a straight answer. 

“Mr. Emmer, do you agree with President Trump that say[s] 5,000 Somali residents in your district in St. Cloud are garbage?” Migrant Insider’s Pablo Manríquez asked Emmer while he walked down a hallway. 

The Republican majority whip offered a weak, political nonanswer. 

“I think what President Trump has done is raise an issue that is something that we’ve been trying to raise for almost three years,” he replied. “The press refuse to cover things that are right in front of them—”

“Donald Trump said that the Somalis are garbage; that’s what I’m asking you about,” Manríquez replied. 

“If you could let me finish, I’d love to answer your question,” Emmer said. “But apparently you wanna have an argument.” 

“Well, it’s a yes or no.” 

“Maybe you can find someone else that you can have the argument with. ’Cause I’m tellin’ ya, not all Somalis are bad—”

“Thank you.” 

“Ninety percent of the … crimes that have been charged are from the Somali community, and there’s nothing wrong, and nothing racist, about calling out crime.” 

There is no evidence that 90 percent of the crimes in Emmer’s district are committed by Somalis. Perhaps Emmer was trying to pivot to the scandal in Minnesota, in which the state’s social services system was defrauded out of more than $1 billion in taxpayer dollars. Federal prosecutors allege that nearly all of the perpetrators came from Minnesota’s Somali community. So far, prosecutors have convicted 59 people. There are about 80,000 Somali Americans in Minnesota.

Trump did much more than just “call out crime.” He smeared an entire group of people simply based on their origin, something he’s made a career out of.  

“When you look at what [Minnesota Governor Walz has] done with Somalia, which is barely a country … they have no anything, they just run around killing each other,” Trump said earlier this month. “I hear [Somalians] ripped off that state for billions of dollars … I don’t want ’em in our country, I’ll be honest with you. Somebody’ll say ‘Ooh that’s not politically correct.’ I don’t care. I don’t want ’em in our country. Their country’s no good for a reason. Their country stinks, and we don’t want ’em in our country.

“We’re gonna go the wrong way if we keep taking garbage into our country. Ilhan Omar is garbage. Her friends are garbage.… When they come from hell, and they complain, and do nothing but bitch? We don’t want ’em in our country. Let ’em go back to where they came from and fix it.” 

Representative Ilhan Omar just called the Department of Homeland Security’s bluff after it denied that ICE agents had ever pulled over her son.

DHS claimed Tuesday that the agency had “absolutely ZERO record” of federal agents pulling over Omar’s son, after the Minnesota Democrat revealed over the weekend that her son had been in the crosshairs of the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown targeting the Somali American community in the Minneapolis-St. Paul metro area.

“With no evidence, it is shameful that Congresswoman Omar would level accusations to demonize ICE as part of a PR stunt,” DHS said in a statement on X. The department denied that it had committed racial profiling, and said that federal law enforcement uses “reasonable suspicion” to make arrests.

But the Somali American congresswoman doubled down—and told DHS to bring receipts.  

“The congresswoman’s son and others were pulled over by ICE, racially profiled, and forced to prove their citizenship with a passport. ICE has long operated as a rogue agency beyond reform,” she said in a statement. “It’s no surprise that an agency known for disappearing people also can’t keep its records straight. ICE now claims it has records of all the stops, and our office would welcome the opportunity to review them.”

It’s pretty ironic that ICE would balk at claims that it engaged in racial profiling after it begged the Supreme Court to allow it to profile individuals based on race, ethnicity, and language in its efforts to detain immigrants. And of course, there are also plenty of well-documented reports of ICE and Border Patrol agents racially profiling people.

Earlier this month, a federal judge ruled that the Trump administration had illegally lowered the standard for making immigration arrests when it instituted a policy of “reasonable suspicion” instead of “probable cause.” The judge barred federal officers from making warrantless arrests unless the person was in the country illegally and a flight risk.