CNN’s senior White House correspondent mocked the overreaction from MAGA figures after an escalator at the U.N. General Assembly in New York stalled just as Donald Trump stepped onto it.
During an appearance on The Lead, Kristen Holmes wryly dubbed the minor incident, which prompted calls for a full inquiry from White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, as “Escalatorgate 2025.”
“The press secretary [posted] an article, or at least a screenshot of an article in a British newspaper, The Times, that said some U.N. staffers had been joking about turning off the escalator and the elevators and then just telling President Trump, ‘Oh, it’s because we’re out of money,’” Holmes said.
“She posted that with this call for some sort of investigation, and calling for anyone involved to be fired.”
For decades, the suffix “-gate” has been tacked onto everything from minor fallouts to major scandals. The trope originated from Watergate, regarded as the biggest political scandal in U.S. history, which ultimately led to the resignation of former President Richard Nixon.
Ahead of his U.N. speech, Trump endured a minor embarrassment when the escalator he and first lady Melania Trump were riding came to a sudden halt, forcing them to walk up the now-stationary steps.
Leavitt suggested the stoppage was deliberate and an act of sabotage, telling Fox News’ Jesse Watters it “doesn’t look like a coincidence to me.”
“I know that we have people, including United States Secret Service, who are looking into this to try to get to the bottom of it,” Leavitt said. “And if we find these were U.N. staffers who were purposely trying to trip up, literally trip up, the president and the first lady of the United States, there better be accountability for those people, and I will personally see to it.”
However, a source told the Daily Beast it may have been someone in Trump’s own entourage who accidentally triggered the emergency stop while rushing ahead of the president.
That version was later backed up by the U.N., which said a “videographer from the U.S. delegation” set off the escalator’s built-in safety mechanism, just as Trump was stepping on at the bottom.
“The safety mechanism is designed to prevent people or objects from being caught and pulled into the gearing,” said Stéphane Dujarric, spokesperson for U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres. “The videographer may have inadvertently triggered the safety function.”
Trump blamed the U.N. for the escalator incident during his speech, which was also plagued by technical difficulties with his teleprompter. The president lamented that he does not get any credit from the U.N. for apparently ending or resolving seven conflicts since he returned to office.
“These are the two things I got from the United Nations, a bad escalator and a bad teleprompter,” Trump said. “Thank you very much.”
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