At 5 a.m. this morning, an interview Donald Trump was apparently warned not to give went live for the entire world to see. “A lot of people said, ‘Don’t do this interview,’” he admitted. Within minutes, we understood exactly why he was advised not to give it. The President of the United States is consumed with building monuments across Washington, the bigger, the gaudier, the better. He is obsessed with making sure as many things as possible are left behind when he is gone, going so far as to admit that when confronted with the accusation that he is quite literally building monuments to himself, Trump didn’t deny it. He agreed. “That’s true,” he said. “Nobody will do it once I’m gone. When I leave here, nobody will.”
The interview, published by New York Magazine and written by Ben Terris, showed a Donald Trump who did not appear particularly concerned about how anyone would interpret what he was saying. What quickly became obvious was how focused the president was on everything but actually carrying out the duties of the presidency. How, instead of focusing on the mounting crises facing the country, he wasn’t shy about his plan to make as many things as possible bear his name and, in some cases, his image, whether the country wants it or not.
He bragged about his pet project and favorite thing to talk about, the ballroom, and how it was being accented with gold that Trump refers to as “God’s favorite metal.” He told Terris it shares design aspects with the Palace of Versailles but will be, in his words, “more beautiful.” He bragged about the concrete: “You could take a jackhammer and go to those columns and stand there for two days at full blast and you wouldn’t even see a mark. It’s nuclear concrete. It’s meant for if there’s a nuclear attack. I’m not sure you could take it down.”
But it was in that moment that he slipped. He actually shared that he was not just building a ballroom; he was building a nuclear fortress because, as much as he loves vanity projects, there are reports that he has also grown more fearful about the risks of retaliation after starting a new forever war, something else he was warned not to do.
With Donald Trump, his agenda is never just one thing. He leads his life from one impulsive decision to the next, but some of the things he does are multifaceted. Right now, it is about righting perceived wrongs that he has created in his mind, protecting himself from his increasing unpopularity here at home and abroad, and building monuments and buildings designed to outlast him and the democracy he is hell-bent on destroying.
Trump told Terris exactly where this obsession began without even meaning to. In the spring of 2010, he called David Axelrod, then President Obama’s senior adviser, and pitched himself as a ballroom builder. “I build ballrooms,” Axelrod recalls Trump telling him. “I build the greatest ballrooms in the world. You have these state dinners, and you have them in these shitty little tents in the back. It’s not befitting. Let me build a modular ballroom for you.” Axelrod passed the message along. Nobody called Trump back. Fifteen years later, Axelrod told Terris: “If we had let him build his modular ballroom, perhaps we wouldn’t have had to demolish the East Wing. And in that sense, I kind of regret not doing it.”
Trump said he holds no grudge, but he still said this: “They’re not good businesspeople. If somebody offers you a free ballroom, take it, right?” Because for Trump, everything is transactional, and he never misses an opportunity for a money grab even if it is not in the best interest of the country. For nearly a decade and a half, he could not let it go. By the time he returned to the White House, he was ready for revenge in all shapes and sizes, including that perceived snub from Obama about the ballroom. “In the first term, I was under siege,” he told Terris. “I didn’t feel it was the atmosphere.” Then he added: “Now is a much more powerful time.” That is how he sees this presidency. A vehicle to carry out all of his worst impulses.
With all of the pushback on the ballroom project and his other vanity projects, the Trump administration has leaned heavily into national security as the justification for some of their projects and the high cost to taxpayers. Trump told Terris that when top generals heard about the ballroom, they arranged a meeting: “They said, ‘Sir, we’d like to build things, it would be a dream, but there’s never been anything like this proposed. If we could build underground, we could go down five stories.’” Terris asked if there was currently a bunker at the White House. “Not much of a place,” Trump said. Then Terris asked the question that so many of us think about when we consider how this all ends, if it ever does. What if a president just decided not to leave? What if he holed up in his new bunker after the 2028 election?
Laughing, Trump said, “I haven’t heard that one,” continuing with, “But I tell you what, it would be awfully tough to get you out. Nobody would be able to get you out.”
If you have some time this weekend, this piece is worth your time to read in its entirety; there is much more in it, and Terris masterfully connects a lot of what Trump has done in the past with what he is doing now, and what he plans to do urgently before the midterms and after.
Beyond the ballroom itself is something much larger. What Trump is doing to the physical landscape of our country, and especially Washington, D.C., is exactly what he is doing to everything else behind the scenes. He is tearing down what came before him, erasing what others built, and replacing it all with himself. We know the policies he has gutted, and the alliances he has destroyed. The institutions he has hollowed out are not forgotten either. And we can’t forget the invisible things he has attacked with the disinformation campaigns around facts in the trafficking ring files and science. But the construction projects and what he has torn down are tangible, visible in your face proof of what he is doing. The two sit in the same space. A madman is tearing down what we can see and what we can’t.
Something I haven’t been able to process myself was the dismantling of “Blue” at the Kennedy Center earlier this week. The twenty-four-foot cobalt blue sculpture created by the artist Joel Shapiro, who passed away just last year, has stood outside the Reach annex since 2019. It was a beloved piece of public art that Shapiro described as “a celebration of possibility.” That is what this administration chose to tear down.
This week, the administration also announced that construction will begin in two weeks on the 250-foot triumphal arch planned for Memorial Circle, directly between the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington National Cemetery, where generations of our war dead are buried. This deeply unpopular construction project would stand more than twice as tall as the Lincoln Memorial, and cast a shadow over one of the most sacred resting places for the bravest amongst us. A place where the monuments already there were built to remember the sacrifice of the people who came before us. Donald Trump knows he can never compete with the likes of those buried there, so the next best thing in his mind is to build himself a monument to literally overshadow them. He thinks this will make him appear greater than them, and more historically significant. Someone to never forget. We know it will do the absolute opposite. It will make him look exactly as he really is, small and weak. When Trump was asked about the size of the arch, he said, “I’d like it to be the biggest one of all. We’re the biggest, most powerful nation. I’d like it to be the biggest one.”
I am still exhausted from the federal actions that took place around my house yesterday. Some days it feels like the weight of paying attention in this time of history is more than any of us should have to carry. But we do. Each and every day, because the alternative is silence, and silence in this moment is something none of us can afford.
On Wednesday, Trump gave a truly unhinged speech in the Rose Garden, full of his usual propaganda and scare tactics. But what I zeroed in on was when he inadvertently told us his plan for the midterms. Trump said: “We’re going to take that final 30 days; you don’t want to go too much before that because people forget.” He was referring to his campaigning schedule and how he wasn’t going to put his efforts into it until those last 30 days. This is something that we can all use to plan our resistance to his authoritarian takeover. We now have the advantage of something he is going to wish that he still had: time.
Tonight we are exactly two months from the midterm elections. Trump just told us he is not getting serious for another 30. We have double the time he does. That means that every single conversation we start right now, every voter that we help register, and every door we knock on between now and the beginning of October is ground he will never make up. His incompetence is a strategic gift, and it may be one of the most important things we have going for us.
If you’re tired, I understand. I am too. But this is not forever. If we do all we can and take back Congress, it won’t solve all of our problems, but it will slow his destruction and finally bring back accountability and checks and balances. When the road gets long and hard, hang onto that hope and let yourself imagine what that could do in the moments that feel overwhelming.
I’ve started adding a new element of my resistance this past week. I’m actively injecting Trump’s failure and incompetence into as many conversations, big and small, as I can. When someone talks about the rising cost of gasoline (I just filled up at almost $6.50 a gallon!) I remind them what wars in the Middle East do and that Trump started one without permission and without support from allies other than Israel. When I recently had to explain why people we knew had moved away, I gave the long explanation that they were scientists, and their company made the rare decision to move them to Europe to safeguard their work. When local corruption surfaces, I point out that corruption at the top gives those down below what they see as permission to commit their own corruption. Our biggest challenge is that people have to feel it themselves to care, or they have to see the destruction with their own eyes. We need to guide their sight and understanding so they know it is here. It is already impacting their lives, and if we do not vote against the Trump machine in November, it will get a lot worse.
The MAGA movement has never been shy about wearing its beliefs and loyalty in the form of red hats and Trump merchandise. They follow the assigned talking points and never question their leader. In the past, they would have been worried and scared to show their ugly views to their neighbors and the world. Now they wear them like a badge, and it is time for us to flip that. We have to take a stand and remind people that hate never made a country great, nor did standing beside and empowering a strongman.
Our odds of a major upset in November just keep getting better, especially the more interviews that Donald Trump gives. Democrats currently lead the generic congressional ballot by six to seven points, the largest margin since the 2018 blue wave that flipped 41 seats. Trump’s approval sits at roughly 38%, with 58% of Americans disapproving. Among independents, his approval has fallen to 34%, below the level that preceded that wave. Independents are one of the strongest groups of voters we have. Their abandonment of Trump could make or break most elections and especially this one. They are not the die-hard Trump loyalists. They are loyal to no one. The stat that carries a heavy weight is just how many are sick and tired of their costs going up while the president spends copious amounts of money on his ego-building, with 65% of Americans dissatisfied with his vanity projects.
We are two months away from sending a powerful message to the White House and to our allies. We need to make sure it is crystal clear. The message must be that Donald Trump’s grasp on our country has come to an end. That we, the people, control this country, not a power-hungry man obsessed with a gold-plated ballroom and certainly not his sycophants. All signs point to the message already reaching those who need to hear it most. That is why I still have hope for America. And you should, too.
I’ll see you tomorrow,
Heather
PS. You can make a significant difference right now by subscribing to my Substack. Your support helps me cover more ground and keep telling the truth about the lies and destruction unfolding in this country.
This commentary represents my personal opinions and analysis of matters of public concern, informed by publicly available information. Any references to individuals constitute opinion and commentary protected under the First Amendment.
Picture of the day: Years ago, I had a doctor who always prescribed 20 minutes at the beach, no matter what was ailing you. Today, I decided I was in need of that treatment. It was peaceful up until the last minute, when this crafty seagull stole a fellow beachgoer's snack. They eventually caught up with it, took the granola bar back, opened it, and gave it back to the bird. That doctor was right; I did feel better.
Sources used in the writing of this post:
https://abcnews.com/US/wireStory/kennedy-center-disassembles-blue-sculpture-grounds-136148565
https://abc13.com/post/trumps-proposed-arch-gets-preliminary-approval-key-agency/19481380/
https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2026/09/03/trump-campaign-35-republicans-midterms/4891788448351/
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/5984107-democratic-poll-leads-gop/
https://intel.morningconsult.com/mc-content/trackers/2026-midterm-election-generic-ballot-polls
https://www.npr.org/2026/05/08/nx-s1-5810515/us-war-trump-nato-iran-europe-canada-germany
Heather it's not surprising you're still feeling a bit shaken after what happened in your neighbourhood the other day. I hope things settle down.for your family.
You know, any time the narcissistic psychopath starts a sentence with Sir, you just know that he's making it all up, just like the time he said he had stopped 10 wars (or was the number higher?)
You know I still have a foreboding that in the run up to the November mid elections Trump will find a reason to disrupt the elections. I hope I'm wrong.
Keep up the great work Heather so more and more Americans realise just how important their vote will be this November. Every vote can make the difference!