Ex-Trump aide echoes Newsom's Marie Antoinette insult as she slams president's ballroom
Donald Trump's former assistant Alyssa Farah Griffin slammed the president for constructing a $250million ballroom as she echoed Gavin Newsom's dig and compared him to Marie Antoinette
A former aide to Donald Trump has repeated Gavin Newsom's Marie Antoinette dig at the president as she slams his plans for a White House ballroom.
The View host Alyssa Farah Griffin, who worked as a White House spokesperson and assistant to Trump during his first term, tore into the president after work crews began demolishing part of the East Wing on Monday to clear the way for his 90,000-square-foot, $250 million ballroom. “The optics, Americans are struggling ... The cost of living is not coming down, you have more unemployed Americans than you do jobs available right now,” Griffin said.
"It feels like Marie Antoinette, let them eat cake, we’re building a ballroom while [you] pay the bill," she added. Her comments echoed similar criticism from Newsom earlier this month.
The California governor called the president a "beautiful queen" as he repeatedly shared an AI-generated image showing Trump dressed as the French monarch Marie Antoinette. Marie Antoinette was France's last queen and was largely unpopular during her reign.
She was on the throne when the French Revolution began in 1789. The monarch was known for spending lavishly and enjoying an extravagant court life while France faced an increasing debt and her subjects went hungry.
Newsom likened Trump to Antoinette after it was revealed the president planned to continue constructing his ballroom despite the government shutdown causing chaos across the country.
Mimicking the president's trademark all-caps social media posts, Newsom's press office captioned their first post of the image: “TRUMP “MARIE ANTOINETTE” SAYS, “NO HEALTH CARE FOR YOU PEASANTS, BUT A BALLROOM FOR THE QUEEN!”
Sharing the image again the next day, they wrote: "NEW PROFILE PIC! In honor of our Queen!" Hours later, they posted the image again, calling the Trump version of Marie Antoinette "beautiful". They captioned it: "PEASANTS, SHUT UP ABOUT YOUR HEALTH CARE! OUR QUEEN’S BALLROOM WILL BE ALMOST AS BEAUTIFUL AS HER!"
Griffin also said she fears that Trump's ballroom will look "more like a Florida country club" than the White House. Trump and top White House officials had initially said nothing would be demolished during construction.
But construction crews began tearing down the facade of the East Wing this week. The ballroom will dwarf the main White House itself, at nearly double the size, and Trump says it will accommodate 999 people.
Trump is building the ballroom because he says the White House needs a large entertaining space and has complained that the East Room, the current largest space in the White House, is too small, holding about 200 people.
Trump says the project will be paid for with private donations and that no public money will be spent on the ballroom. The White House promised to release information on which individuals and corporations have pledged or donated money and invited some of the donors to an East Room dinner last week, but has not released a comprehensive list and breakdown of funds.