What did Donald Trump do today?

He went all in on the concept of a "Militarily Top Secret Ballroom."

 

Last night, Trump's appearance at the White House Correspondents Dinner was interrupted when an armed man tried to rush through the outer security perimeter. He was immediately detained. Trump and other White House officials were moved from the ballroom where the event was being held, and then subsequently returned to the White House after the suspect had been arrested.

It's important to note that the suspect, Cole Allen, never got anywhere near Trump, or even within two floors of him. The Hilton hotel where the event was held was open to the public, and Allen was brought down as he was trying to run through the first of several security perimeters. Other people, including Trump's security detail, were in danger, but Trump was not.

But what Trump seems to have taken away from this is that he is desperately endangered, and that he must be given carte blanche to construct a "Militarily Top Secret Ballroom." (Unbelievably, that is a direct quote.) This is, of course, the gaudy and at times physically impossible building that Trump has been obsessed with building since he returned to office, and for which he destroyed the historic East Wing of the White House before he had permission to build it.

What happened last night is exactly the reason that our great Military, Secret Service, Law Enforcement and, for different reasons, every President for the last 150 years, have been DEMANDING that a large, safe, and secure Ballroom be built ON THE GROUNDS OF THE WHITE HOUSE. This event would never have happened with the Militarily Top Secret Ballroom currently under construction at the White House. It cannot be built fast enough! While beautiful, it has every highest level security feature there is plus, there are no rooms sitting on top for unsecured people to pour in, and is inside the gates of the most secure building in the World, The White House. The ridiculous Ballroom lawsuit, brought by a woman walking her dog, who has absolutely No Standing to bring such a suit, must be dropped, immediately. Nothing should be allowed to interfere with with its construction, which is on budget and substantially ahead of schedule!!!

Trump even had DOJ lawyers demand today that the National Trust for Historic Preservation drop its lawsuit against the construction of the "ballroom," claiming with a straight face that the absence of a ballroom on the White House grounds is endangering Trump's life. 

 

 

Trump's claim that presidents have been clamoring for this for 150 years is, obviously, a lie. In reality, neither President Ulysses S. Grant nor any subsequent president had ever mentioned anything like the combination defense bunker/ballroom Trump is imagining. That includes the three living former presidents, none of whom supported the "ballroom" idea or Trump's destruction of the historic East Wing. It also includes several presidents who oversaw major renovations to the White House (both Roosevelts, Eisenhower, Kennedy, and even Trump during his first term) but never gave any thought to a "militarily top secret ballroom."

All presidents in recent decades have experienced "threats" like this that were dealt with by their perimeter security. Would-be assailants occasionally try to climb the outer fence around the White House, or fire at the (bulletproof) windows of the building from the street.

Trump has faced "threats" of similar magnitude, where intruders were stopped long before getting anywhere near him, at both Mar-a-Lago and his private golf courses, where he has spent about a third of his presidency. He has not indicated that he'll stop going to those places.

Why does this matter? 

• If Trump feels the need to hide in a bunker for the rest of his presidency, the White House already has one.  

• If there were a good reason to destroy a third of the White House and build a ballroom, then Trump wouldn't need to ignore the law and make up excuses to do it anyway.

• It is just so unbelievably embarrassing for the United States to have its president talking about a "top secret Ballroom" as though that made any sense at all.