On Friday morning, much of the political world’s focus was on the looming deadline for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program beneficiaries: At midnight, tens of millions of low-income Americans were poised to lose their federal food assistance. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins told reporters that the issue was foremost on Donald Trump’s mind.
The president soon after suggested otherwise.
On Friday afternoon, with roughly 11 hours remaining before the SNAP deadline, the Republican used his social media platform to promote images of the new marble he’d installed in a refurbished White House bathroom. A half-hour later, he published another online item on the new marble columns at the Kennedy Center, which he said “look magnificent.”
By Friday night, the president’s day took a rather farcical turn. USA Today reported:
President Donald Trump hosted a Great Gatsby-themed party at Mar-A-Lago on Oct. 31, as multiple federal judges ruled the administration could not stop funding food aid amid the ongoing government shutdown. The party was labeled ‘A Little Party Never Killed Nobody’ according to multiple media attendees. The title was drawn from a song on the soundtrack of the 2013 movie adaptation of ‘The Great Gatsby.’
The report added that attendees were seen “mimicking ‘Roaring 20’s’ era attire, a period just before the Great Depression that historians note for its staggering income inequity.” (Historian Heather Cox Richardson added that F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1925 novel “skewered the immoral and meaningless lives of the very wealthy during the Jazz Age who spent their time throwing extravagant parties and laying waste to the lives of the people around them.”)
To be sure, a story like this one has a handful of notable angles, including Trump’s preoccupation with White House redecorating and renovation projects.
But I find myself stuck on the broader story the Republican seems eager to tell.
As millions of American families confronted soaring health care costs and the loss of food assistance, their wealthy president prepared to leave his mansion for another golf weekend at the glorified country club he owns.
Before he left, however, he thought it’d be a good idea to publish a series of photographs, boasting with pride about the marble bathroom he installed, complete with an above-toilet chandelier.
In one of the images, the public can see what appears to be construction related to the president’s ballroom vanity project — a wildly unnecessary addition that will sit empty for most of the year and will only be used occasionally by the hyperelite.
After publishing the photographs, the same president boarded his jet and went to Florida — during a government shutdown that he’s made little effort to stop — for a trip that included a fancy party with his wealthy customers in the theme of a classic novel about some awful people who wasted money on lavish soirees.
Part of me assumes we’ll soon see a “let them eat marble” missive published to Trump’s social media platform.
I frequently find myself thinking about a report from The Washington Post that was published the day after Christmas 2024 that highlighted the perspectives of several low-income voters who supported the Trump ticket in the November election. The article specifically referred to a middle-aged Pennsylvania woman who struggled to make ends meet despite receiving food stamps and Social Security benefits, and explained why she voted for the Republican ticket.
Trump “is more attuned to the needs of everyone instead of just the rich,” the woman told the Post. “I think he knows it’s the poor people that got him elected, so I think Trump is going to do more to help us.”
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