The View cohosts had a lot to say about Donald Trump‘s recent White House renovations on the Thursday, March 20, episode of the talk show. With Whoopi Goldberg absent for a work obligation in Italy, Joy Behar took over as moderator and kicked off the Hot Topics segment.
“Millions of Americans are worried about healthcare and social security cuts, so what is the President of the United States doing right now? Watch.” The show then featured a clip of Trump showing off his recent renovations to the Oval Office and Rose Garden.
“He’s like the interior decorator in chief now,” Behar joked. “Forget the nuclear button, I don’t even trust him with the button that gets him a Diet Coke.” She then pointed out that Trump is also planning to “completely retool the Kennedy Center,” too. “Is there no safe place to go with anymore with this guy?” she wondered.
Alyssa Farah Griffin agreed that Trump’s decorations looked ridiculous, and she slammed him for focusing on renovating amid the country’s economic issues. “It’s not breaking news that Trump’s aesthetic is somewhere between Pablo Escobar and Liberace. He loves a gold tchotchke. We know this. The decor on that mantle, it’s a lot, and I don’t presume to have particularly great taste myself,” she began. “This is classic Trump. He wants to drive the news cycle with, ‘Oh, he’s changing the Rose Garden, oh he’s shaking up the Kennedy Center,’ to distract from the fact that yesterday the feds forecasted higher inflation and less economic growth as a direct result of his tariffs, and even more tariffs are going into affect on April 2, unless he changes his mind again.”
She continued, “I think the imagery of seeing this gold-plated palace of an Oval Office, to a lot of Americans, people are still struggling with the cost of living. The reason people voted for him is they thought he was going to bring that down, and so far it doesn’t seem like he’s making any effort to do it yet.”
Behar slammed the president as “unaware of himself,” and wondered, “He doesn’t realize that people are losing money, they’re losing jobs, they might lose their social security, and he’s gilding the lily in the White House?”
Sara Haines added her own two cents about Trump’s interior design skills. “I thought, ‘Maybe it’s better for him to get into decorating. He can get Elon Musk for some help in the living rooms,’” she joked. “The difference with Jackie Kennedy [when she gave a tour] is she was the first lady. This is the president with a bunch of gold statues that look like they’re from high school.”
Ana Navarro was confused by the “amount of clutter” in Trump’s Oval Office, particularly his “replica” of the FIFA World Cup. “He needs to, like, Marie Condo the Oval Office at this point,” she said.
Sunny Hostin pointed out that presidents “often do” make changes to the Oval Office, referencing Barack Obama adding busts of Martin Luther King Jr. and Abraham Lincoln when he was commander in chief. However, she said Trump’s additions were “overdone” and “not appropriate.”
Behar threw in one final zinger by adding, “This guy will put in a bust of Stormy Daniels,” before they cut to a commercial break.
The View, Weekdays, 11 a.m., ABC
This story originally appeared on TV Insider
