NEED TO KNOW
- While showing off the Oval Office during an interview with Laura Ingraham, President Donald Trump insisted that his bright new wall decorations are made of real gold
- Earlier in the year, internet users spread a theory that the appliqués might have been cheap decorations purchased at Home Depot and spray-painted to resemble gold
- “You know the one thing with gold? You can’t imitate gold, real gold. There’s no paint that imitates gold,” the president claimed
Donald Trump addressed the internet’s long-standing question about his Oval Office renovations: Did he use real gold, or shop at Home Depot for a bargain?
The 79-year-old president gave Fox News’ Laura Ingraham a tour of the White House during a two-part interview for her show, The Ingraham Angle.
In a clip shared to Instagram on Tuesday, Nov. 11, the reporter teased her conversation with Trump as they toured the Oval Office, the president’s primary workspace in the White House.
Since beginning his second term in January, Trump has undertaken several renovations at the White House. In the Oval Office specifically, he redecorated by adding gold decals and statuary to the walls in a style that replicates the aesthetic of Mar-a-Lago, his Palm Beach, Fla., club.
“You know the one thing with gold? You can’t imitate gold, real gold. There’s no paint that imitates gold,” Trump bragged in the interview, prompting Ingraham to ask, “So these aren’t, like, from Home Depot?”
“No, this is not Home Depot stuff. This is not Home Depot,” Trump insisted.
Ingraham’s question appeared to call back to a rumor that first started in the spring when the president began showing off his updated Oval Office.
BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP via Getty
In an Inside Edition report, Trump was filmed showing off the additions to his “new and improved Oval Office.”
“It becomes more and more beautiful with love — you know, we handle it with great love — and 24-karat gold. That always helps, too,” he said in the clip.
However, some online believed that Trump had sourced the decorations from somewhere like Home Depot, with one person finding a similar plastic piece on sale at the home improvement store for just over $58. Trump’s critics began popularizing the theory that the White House purchased the designs for a bargain and had them spray-painted to resemble gold.
“In the Oval Office with President Trump and can confirm that it is REAL gold!” Ingraham captioned the new clip of him seemingly addressing the theory.
In another portion of the interview, Ingraham was shown around the White House grounds by Trump, getting a sense of the ballroom that Trump is building on the east side of the property, as well as his redesigned Rose Garden (now dubbed “The Rose Garden Club at the White House”) and his Presidential Walk of Fame.
Trump took credit for the Walk of Fame, which features images of the presidents over the years, saying, “Everything’s my idea, sadly.”
Notably, former President Joe Biden‘s portrait was absent from the wall and replaced with an image of an autopen device, with Trump referring to him as “the worst president in the history of our country.”
