'Smacking the founders in the face': Conservative slams Trump for White House demolition
Military historian Edward Lengel said Thursday the Trump administration was "smacking" the Founding Fathers "in the face" by demolishing the East Wing of the White House to make way for President Donald Trump's ballroom.
During a podcast with former CNN host Jim Acosta released Thursday, Lengel said, "I've written a bunch of books about George Washington, including for the 1790s when he and [Thomas] Jefferson were working together and conceptualized the White House with James Hoban. So, they had an idea of what they wanted."
"And it's really on that point, I think that they're just like smacking the founders in the face. And that really bothers me," he said of the Trump administration.
He continued: "Washington and Jefferson worked together on the concept of what the President's house, the executive mansion, was intended to represent. Washington understood the symbolism. He understood the precedent that was being set on so many different levels as did Jefferson. And, you know, it's an interesting contrast because Jefferson and Washington were political opponents. They disagreed on a lot of things and they came to really dislike each other, particularly the era of the French Revolution, they had very different ideas."
Lengel added that Jefferson wanted the house to be smaller, but Washington thought it should be bigger.
"But they worked together, just as in the Constitution. So many pillars of our society and our government formed by compromise to develop a common symbol that was meant to represent a certain idea of what this republic represented."
Lengel added: "Now, I can say with absolute certainty, Thomas Jefferson would absolutely go ballistically insane if he knew about this ballroom."
Lengel further argued that the idea in the first place that this structure pays total respect to the existing building just by its existence disrespects the existing building. It turns the Mansion House into an annex to the ballroom because of the size. It totally does that," he added.
He also criticized conservatives for supporting the move.
"I'm a conservative in a lot of ways, and I think conservatives are being disingenuous about this. Do the founders matter or don't they matter does their intent matter? Are you really an originalist or are you saying, 'oh wait, they don't matter or we need to modernize them,' which I find highly ironic," Lengel said.
