Expensive Balls

Mexico still has not paid for Donald Trump's border wall

For months, anytime Donald Trump's planned ballroom, which he destroyed the East Wing, was criticized, a MAGAt would come along and point out that it was only being paid for by donors and Donald Trump himself. Now that we know that is no longer true, where are those guys?

Of course, it's not new that what Trump was telling us was a lie. We always knew it was a lie. Remember the lie that Mexico was going to pay for the border wall? Trump began his 2016 campaign on that lie, along with telling us that Mexico was sending us rapists and murderers.

When a promise by Donald Trump falls apart, and it is undisputed that it is a lie, we're supposed to forget about it. We're supposed to forget that Donald Trump promised that he would be “too busy” to play golf if he won the presidency. We are supposed to forget that he would eventually release his taxes. We are supposed to forget that he was going to give us a brand new healthcare plan in two weeks, way back in 2016. We are supposed to forget that Donald Trump was going to lower the price of gasoline. We are supposed to forget that promise about no new wars. We are supposed to forget that Donald Trump was going to make housing more affordable. We are supposed to forget that Donald Trump was going to drain the swamp. We are supposed to forget that Donald Trump was going to lower the price of groceries. We are supposed to forget that he was going to release the Epstein files. We are supposed to forget that he was going to end the Russia/Ukraine war in his first 24 hours back in office. And we are supposed to forget that Mexico was going to pay for his racist border wall.

And now, we are supposed to forget that Donald Trump's ballroom was only going to cost $200 million. We're supposed to forget that it went up from $200 million to $250 million. We are supposed to forget that it increased from $250 million to $300 million. We're supposed to forget that it increased from $300 million to $400 million. We're supposed to forget that it increased from $400 million to $1 billion. And finally, we are supposed to forget that this was going to be paid for by donors and Donald Trump himself, because now Senate Republicans plan to make you and me pay for it.

Republicans are moving ahead with a $70 billion, party-line plan to fund ICE and Border Patrol for the rest of Trump's term, which is supposed to end in January 2029. This will free up both agencies from political pressure and congressional oversight at least until the next administration, if there is a next administration.

Republicans have also snuck $1 billion into this bill to fund the ballroom, which they say is only for security measures. They say the funds may not be used for any non-security elements of the project, which the administration says is being funded through private donations.

But we cannot trust that they are going to build this ballroom only through private donations. And, since his ballroom is not necessary, that means neither is the $1 billion for the security measures. The East Wing had an underground bunker before Donald Trump destroyed it. Mark my word, they will end up claiming that every part of this ballroom is a security element.

And the argument that the attempt on Trump's life at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner is proof that we need this ballroom is just more bullshit.

That dinner is not a government affair. And it hosts more attendees than Trump's planned ballroom will have the capacity for. We are supposed to fork over another $1 billion because, quite frankly, the Secret Service fucked up?

Maybe we can pay for this ballroom by renting it out every weekend for flea markets. By the time this ballroom is completed, there should be a lot of used MAGA caps out there that people will be looking to offload.

And then there is the issue of Donald Trump destroying half of the White House without any oversight. I seriously doubt King Charles could dismantle half of Buckingham Palace without approval from Parliament.

Another detail that MAGAts overlook is that the funding for the ballroom through private donors is extremely shady. There has been zero accounting for all of the donors and how much they are giving. There is no oversight as to how the money is being spent. And we don't know what Donald Trump is promising in exchange for donations. Oh, did you think all these billionaires were giving money to Donald Trump out of the goodness of their hearts? Do you believe they are giving Donald Trump millions of dollars because they love America so much? Sure, and all those lawsuit settlements with the likes of X, Facebook, and CBS, etc., were not bribes, wink, wink.

We can't trust these people. Donald Trump's 2017 inaugural committee raised a record $106.8 million. By comparison, President Obama's 2009 inauguration raised $53 million. Trump's fundraising for his first inauguration broke records. So what did we get to see for that $106.8 million in 2017? Three Doors Down and tractors.

The inauguration committee claims that they spent the entirety of that $106.8 million. But they spent it all on a second-rate Nickelback clone and tractors? That money has never been accounted for. We have become so accustomed to Donald Trump's corruption that nobody has even questioned what all the money was spent on for Donald Trump's 2025 inauguration, which was over $239 million. Sure, there were a few balls in town that day where Elon got to throw a couple of Nazi salutes, but what else did we get?

Keep in mind that Donald Trump's 2025 inauguration was held indoors, most likely because he did not want to be embarrassed by tiny crowd sizes again.

The question I will leave you with today is about all those donations. Whether the ballroom is paid for by taxpayers or not, Donald Trump has still collected hundreds of millions of dollars in donations for the project, for which he never got approval from Congress. So the question is, if the private donations are not spent on the ballroom, what is Donald Trump going to do with all that money?

Psst: I'm excited about the cartoon I plan to draw for tomorrow.

Drawn in 30 seconds:

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