Chelsea Clinton has blasted Donald Trump’s White House demolition mission as a “wrecking ball to our heritage.”
In an opinion piece for USA Today, the 45-year-old author and vice chair of the Clinton Foundation claimed that Trump’s “disregard for history” is a defining trait of his presidency.
The only child of former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State and first lady Hillary Clinton said that while she spent her formative years living in the historic building between 1993 and 2001, she “always knew it wasn’t my house. The White House belongs to the American people, and that’s why we call it the People’s House. I never forgot that.”
“A disregard for history is a defining trait of President Trump’s second administration,” Clinton wrote, noting the “outrage at the complete demolition of the East Wing” meant that “I am clearly not alone in feeling unsettled.”
To make way for Trump’s 90,000-square-foot ballroom, the East Wing’s colonnade has been demolished, as well as the public entrance, the first family’s movie theatre, gift shop and the first lady’s office.
A new YouGov America poll shows that 53 percent oppose tearing down the East Wing, while just 24 percent of the 2,000 people polled favor Trump’s redesign of the extension.
“This is what happens when we take a wrecking ball to our heritage,” Clinton wrote. “Our greatness doesn’t come because we ignore our history–it comes because we acknowledge it, we learn from it and build a better future on it, including in the buildings and gardens of the People’s House.”
She also called out recent changes to the White House, including Melania Trump’s renovation of the Rose Garden in her husband’s first term as president.
“President Donald Trump has the right–and clearly has raised the private funds-to pave over the Rose Garden (and denude it of roses) as well as turn the East Wing into a ballroom,“ Clinton wrote.
The ballroom is expected to cost around $300 million. Trump held a dinner at the White House earlier this month to thank wealthy donors who had contributed to funding it.
While Clinton recognized Trump has authority over the White House grounds, she questioned his transparency over the process.
“It is unsettling that such substantial alterations… are being undertaken without a historic-preservation review and seemingly without the involvement of any historians, and I would love to be proven wrong here.”
This week, the White House stated it did not submit construction plans to the National Capital Planning Commission, as the organization oversees construction, not demolition.
On Thursday, White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said Trump may have the authority to tear down any federal building. “It’s not the president who came up with that legal opinion himself, Leavitt said. ”That’s a legal opinion that’s been held by the NCPC for many years.”
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House for comment.
Clinton also pointed out that apart from the presidents and their families, the White House is full of staff, from chefs to plumbers, electricians to housekeepers, historians to arborists.
“Many of those professionals spend substantially more years working in the White House than any presidential family does living in it,” she noted.
Clinton’s column concluded that the White House is a “mirror of our democracy.”
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“Resilient when we honor its foundations but fragile when we take them for granted,” she said.
“What was dismantled today isn’t just marble or plaster; it is a reflection of how easily history can be erased when power forgets purpose.”
Clinton’s piece follows her mother, Hillary, stirring up MAGA with a social media post earlier this week.
Hillary shared a photo of the destruction taking place at the East Wing of the White House to make way for Trump’s bulletproof ballroom, adding the caption “It’s not his house. It’s your house. And he’s destroying it.”
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