At this point, Donald Trump has the hang of taking advantage of failed assassination attempts.
After all, people trying to kill Trump in public is almost old hat. Since his spur-of-the-moment, camera-ready reaction in Butler, Pa. in 2024, Trump has made it through at least two more would-be killings, and he’s ready to cash in on the most recent one immediately. Mere hours after a gunman was arrested near the White House Correspondents’ Dinner in D.C. on Saturday, the president was using the failed attack to stump for his big, beautiful ballroom.
Still wearing his black-tie outfit and flanked by Kash Patel and Markwayne Mullin, Trump told reporters that the attempt only strengthened his resolve to finish the White House outbuilding.
“It’s not a particularly secure building,” he said of the hotel where the event was held. “I didn’t want to say this but this is why we have to have all of the attributes of what we’re planning at the White House… The military are demanding it. They’ve wanted the ballroom for 150 years.”
Trump doubled down on his ballroom demands on Sunday morning, posting to Truth Social that “this event would never have happened” if the ballroom was already built.
“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,” he wrote. “It cannot be built fast enough!”
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Legal challenges to Trump’s plans have made construction of Trump’s $400 million ballroom a stop-and-go affair. In his post, Trump mischaracterized a lawsuit brought by the National Trust for Historic Preservation, saying that it was “brought by a woman walking her dog.”
“[She] has absolutely no standing to bring such a suit,” he said. “Nothing should be allowed to interfere with [the ballroom’s] construction.”
