Again with the rose garden

 This time, just pave it over.

Last time, they turned it into grass and shrubs with a walkway.  No appreciation for anything in nature.

Asked what gave him the idea to make the changes, Trump offered a revealing answer.

“I’ve had it for a long time. In the first term I had it, but, you know, you guys were after me. I said I had to focus. I was the hunted. And now I’m the hunter. There’s a big difference,” he said.

  CNN

Asshole.

Hours later, Trump returned outside, flanked by, among others, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, his daughter Ivanka Trump and son-in-law Jared Kushner, who were at the White House for the swearing in of Charles Kushner as ambassador to France. The president saluted the large American flag, which required five men to hoist up the newly erected pole.

Trump is still a real estate magnate, enthusiastically consumed with the finer details of construction – including the materials used inside the poles, which he says he paid for himself. The reality of his day job, however, repeatedly cut in to Wednesday’s festivities.

A shame the actual job of being president gets in the way.

Trump fielded questions on Iran, Israel, immigration and protests in California. In between, he marveled at the process of lifting the pole, which he said cost “like $50,000.”

“They put sand inside, and if they use dirt or anything else other than sand, it rots out the pole over a period of years. But sand, for some reason, chemically just works. It gives you flexibility and it doesn’t do anything to the cask,” he said as he observed the new, nearly-100-foot pole being put in the ground.

“I love construction,” he added. “I love it, I know it better than anybody.”

What doesn't he know better than anybody?

And I don't believe for a second he paid for anything himself.

“Russia-Ukraine is so stupid, would’ve never happened if I was president. You guys agree with that, right?” Trump said as men in hard hats assembled behind him nodded their heads in agreement.

Wednesday’s pole raising is not the only change coming to the White House as the president seeks to make it more like his Florida club. Construction on the White House Rose Garden is underway, and the historic garden’s green grass is now completely torn up in preparation for a patio installation over the coming weeks.

Trump told Fox News in a March interview he planned to remodel the space with pavers, saying the grass “doesn’t work.”

[...]

The garden’s iconic roses and other plants, however, remained intact and are not expected to be removed.

[...]

As for Trump’s plans to build a ballroom near the White House East Wing, he said Wednesday that construction will “start pretty soon.”

Is this to be like Mar-A-Lago, or like a Southern plantation?

UPDATE 06/21/2025:

Hey, the grass didn't work.