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Trump solves White House Rose Garden mystery
Trump solves White House Rose Garden mystery
Trump announced that he had successfully found the culprit who caused a “huge gash” in the Rose Garden’s new limestone.
Trump’s Rose Garden redesign, ballroom plans spark controversy
President Donald Trump’s Rose Garden redesign drew mixed reactions and stirred controversy after its reveal.
President Donald Trump’s love of surfaces (marble and stone in particular) may just have opened a new career path for him: detective-in-chief.
Trump announced that he had successfully solved a White House whodunit involving “limestone plus” that was recently installed in the Rose Garden in Truth Social post on Aug. 30.
“Three days ago, while admiring the stonework, I happened to notice a huge gash in the limestone that extended more than 25 yards long. It was deep and nasty!,” he wrote. “I started yelling, “Who did this, and I want to find out now!” — And I didn’t say this in a nice manner. I wondered, “Was it vandalism or, was it stupidity?”
But luckily for Trump, the White House, with its “finest security equipment anywhere” was able to identify the apparent culprits through video footage.
“They brought back the stupid people, with their boss watching (in sunglasses!),” wrote Trump.
The subcontractor, Trump said, was using a steel cart that was “broken and titling badly, with it rubbing hard against the soft, beautiful stone.”
The next course of action?
Trump said he’ll “replace the stone, charge the contractor, and never let that contractor work at the White House again.”
“Surfaces are very important to me as a Builder,” he wrote.
The Rose Garden renovation, which involved ripping up sod and replacing it with a stone, had been going on all summer. The project had been completed when Trump noticed the “gash” in the stone. The White House did not immediately respond to when the redo would be completed. Trump previously said he came up with the idea for the new surface after watching women’s heels getting stuck in the mud.
Trump’s been on a redecorating and remodeling binge in and around the White House – from a golden overhaul of the Oval Office to ripping up the sod in the Rose Garden to pave it over with white stone. He’s also planning on adding a 90,000-square-foot ballroom in the East Wing.
No word on whether the crime solving spree was what kept the president out-of-public view from Tuesday − when he presided over a three-hour marathon Cabinet meeting − to Saturday when he finally emerged to play golf.
Swapna Venugopal Ramaswamy is a White House Correspondent for USA TODAY. You can follow her on X @SwapnaVenugopal
