Trump turns White House into tacky Vegas palace with gold cherubs and more bling

Donald Trump has been accused of turning America’s most famous home into a gaudy palace dripping with bling, with Washington insiders branding it “Versailles meets Vegas.”

From golden cherubs and tacky umbrellas to 100ft flagpoles, a £148 million ballroom and giant paintings of himself, the 47th President has remodelled the White House in his own image: flashy, brash, and obsessed with Donald J. Trump. What was once the ‘People’s House’ now bears all the hallmarks of Mar-a-Lago, his Florida resort famed for chandeliers, mirrors and enough gold leaf to sink a ship.

The historic Rose Garden, once the site of JFK’s Cold War speeches and Reagan’s press briefings, has been ripped up. In its place: tiled flooring that looks more “hotel lobby” than history. Trump has been obsessing about paving the space all year. "The slabs of the Rose Garden have been the subject of almost daily discussions,” said one report.

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Trump topped it off with yellow-striped umbrellas and cheap-looking white tables identical to those dotting the poolside at Mar-a-Lago. Aides say the reality TV star even justified the makeover by claiming grass was “bad for women in heels.” Critics, however, say it’s reduced the nation’s most symbolic garden to something resembling a Holiday Inn patio.

This week, Grammy-winning musician Jack White launched a blistering attack on Trump’s garish makeover, comparing it to a “professional wrestler’s dressing room.” The former White Stripes frontman attacked the President after Trump’s Oval Office meeting with Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky on Monday.

White posted an image of the two leaders surrounded by gold ornaments and elaborate fittings, declaring: “Look at how disgusting Trump has transformed the historic White House.”

“It’s now a vulgar, gold-leafed and gaudy, professional wrestler’s dressing room,” he wrote. “Can’t wait for the UFC match on the front lawn too, he’s almost fully achieved the movie Idiocracy.”

White, long an outspoken critic of Trump, said the President had desecrated a symbol of American history with “cheap spectacle and tacky excess,” likening the Oval Office to a parody of itself. His comments added to a chorus of critics who argue Trump’s White House aesthetic reflects personal vanity rather than public duty.

“Can you imagine Jackie Kennedy approving this?” White House tourist Angela Baker said. “It looks like Trump has ordered the West Wing off the Wayfair catalogue.”

Not content with redecorating, Trump has ordered a ballroom fit for one of his golf clubs. Plans show a 90,000-square-foot dancehall bulldozing through the East Wing - booting out offices, including those of the First Lady. He boasts the entire thing will be privately funded, but critics question whether “donors” footing the bill expect VIP invites in return.

“I’m very good at building ballrooms,” Trump bragged earlier this year. “Compliments of a man known as Donald J. Trump.”

Insiders believe the real motive is to create the perfect stage for his speeches and presidential galas. “It’s meant to be for diplomacy,” one source told the Mirror, “but give it six months and he’ll be charging $100,000-a-head for a Mar-a-Lago-style fundraiser with gold-plated champagne buckets.”

Once a room of stately simplicity, the Oval Office now looks more like a casino suite. The iconic fireplace is plastered with gold carvings, countless gold vases line the mantel, and imported cherubs from Mar-a-Lago leer down from the walls.

According to a second source, the overall effect is “Caesars Palace meets Buckingham Palace gift shop. It’s Liberace with nuclear codes.” For decades, the White House halls have told the story of America through portraits of its presidents. Now, they tell the story of one man.

A massive painting of Trump punching the air after surviving an assassination attempt dominates the prime wall space once reserved for Barack Obama. This week, Trump proudly directed the eyes of Europe's leaders, including Sir Keir Starmer, to the picture as they gathered to discuss peace in Ukraine.

Another Trump portrait has been shoehorned between Laura Bush and Hillary Clinton. Last week, the president’s deputy assistant, Sebastian Gorka, unveiled yet another canvas - a smiling President in front of Air Force One.

Even the maps are Trumpified. The Gulf of Mexico has been cheekily relabelled the “Gulf of America.” A copy of the Declaration of Independence hangs in the West Wing with Trump claiming it had been “hidden in the vaults for decades until I found it.”

“It’s a shrine, not a White House,” one visitor scoffed. “You expect history, but you just get Trump on loop.” The US leader also installed two towering 100ft flagpoles on the South Lawn. “Top of the line,” he declared. But their unveiling descended into farce when he rambled: “They call it a lifting. They also use another word, but I’m not gonna use that word. It says with an E…”

Guests exchanged baffled looks. One diplomat muttered: “It’s like he’s building a Trump theme park, one bad idea at a time.” Trump has long had a weakness for the colour gold.

At Trump Tower in New York, he installed gold escalators. At Mar-a-Lago, even the bathroom taps are gold-plated. Now Washington is catching the fever. Chandeliers have been replaced with glittering replacements “straight out of a Vegas casino,” according to one staffer.

Chairs in the Cabinet Room have been re-upholstered in shiny fabrics that gleam under TV lights. “Everywhere you turn, something’s been Trumpified,” one long-serving White House worker is said to have remarked. “It’s as if Midas moved in and had no taste.”

Staff joke nervously about what might be next. A gold-plated helicopter pad? A Trump-branded putting green outside the Lincoln Bedroom? “Nothing would surprise me anymore,” the source added.

Even Republicans are wincing privately. “It’s a caricature of power,” West Virginia MAGA fan Chad Kipling told the Mirror. “The West Wing has become the West Bling, and the symbolism is all wrong. Trump needs to move back to policy and stop spending taxpayers' money on such projects.”

However, some Trump fans lap it up. Supporters see the makeover as a bold statement of America’s wealth and success. “Why shouldn’t our White House look the best?” asked Daphne Perry, from Maryland.

But critics - across party lines - worry the bling overshadows the dignity of the office. “It used to be the People’s House,” Democrat voter Danielle Finn said. “Now it’s Trump’s House of Mirrors.”

From Roosevelt to Obama, presidents have left their mark on the White House. But none quite like Trump. What was once the world’s most powerful address has become a monument to one man’s taste for gold, glitz and grandeur. Or as one weary Washington insider put it: “The West Wing isn’t the beating heart of democracy anymore - it’s the lobby of a third-rate casino.”