Trump’s Unhinged Statement About Bathroom Renovation Reveals a Lot

President Donald Trump on Saturday put a lofty spin on his White House renovations—namely, claiming that, by renovating a bathroom in the White House, he is “saving the heritage of this country.”

During his speech at the Kennedy Center Honors Dinner, Trump dwelled for a while on what, evidently, matters to him more than most else: his mission to force his dictator chic design taste upon the People’s House.

Trump specifically mentioned his renovation to the bathroom of the Lincoln Suite, in the southeast corner of the White House’s second floor. In October, Trump announced that he had refurbished the bathroom with white-and-black-marble.

Prior to his intervention, Trump said on Saturday, “It was the worst job. It was done in—many years ago. It was done during, actually, the Truman administration, with very cheap, green tile. That wasn’t Lincoln.”

Now the bathroom is “beautiful,” he mused, done in Paradiso marble.

The president acknowledged criticisms he received for the vanity project. “People said, ‘Oh, why is he wasting time?’”

He continued, “That’s not wasting time, that’s saving our heritage. You know, many, many things like that, it’s saving the heritage of this country,” to which the audience applauded.

In reality, Trump’s renovations seem more poised to defile than to preserve history (hence the widespread opposition among preservationist groups—not to mention the public—to the administration demolishing the East Wing to accommodate his gargantuan planned ballroom).

The grandiosity with which Trump described his Lincoln Bathroom renovation this weekend is consistent with his description of the renovation when it was first unveiled, at which time he said the new marble is “very appropriate for the time of Abraham Lincoln.” Historians and designers dismissed the claim.

Edward Lengel, former chief historian of the White House Historical Association, told The New York Times, “It doesn’t look anything like 1860s interiors to me.”