The White House ballroom project is about to get even bigger.

East Wing ballroom architect Shalom Baranes revealed new plans for the executive mansion Thursday, showcasing a previously unreported, one-story addition to the West Wing that he claimed would balance out the 90,000-square-foot development.

The expansion, which would take place after the ballroom is completed, would “restore a sense of symmetry around the original central pavilion,” according to Baranes.

Responding to questions from members of the National Capital Planning Commission, Baranes said that the potential West Wing project would affect the West Wing colonnade but not the building proper, reported ABC News. The architect did not offer a timetable for its completion, and did not say if the West Wing’s proposed growth would add to the redevelopment plan’s $400 million price tag. (The project was, initially, supposed to cost $200 million before Donald Trump decided to tack on extra construction.)

Baranes also offered more details on the magnitude of Trump’s highly controversial ballroom, projecting that the new building will have 40-foot ceilings, be able to accommodate up to 1,000 seated guests, and would constitute just 22,000 square feet of the 90,000-square-foot development.

Baranes took over the ballroom project after Trump fired the original architect in early December. Despite handpicking James McCrery II to lead the renovation, Trump soon began clashing with McCrery after he disagreed with Trump’s desired size for the new East Wing.

A White House official who aided the presentation, Josh Fisher, said that the administration is also considering changes to Lafayette Square, which is located due north of the White House in the President’s Park.

Will Scharf, a senior White House official on the NCPC, claimed that the myriad changes to the White House were necessary in order to bring it up to snuff with the residences of other world leaders, comparing the symbol of democracy to the sprawling estates of King Charles of England.

But Trump also has his eyes set on spending heaps of taxpayer money on other portions of Washington.

The “Arc de Trump” is expected to be erected near the Arlington Bridge, opposite the Lincoln Memorial. It will be modeled after the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, the historic monument that commemorates those who fought and died for France during the country’s revolution and the Napoleonic Wars—though the president’s arc is, by its namesake, expected to honor just him.

Trump also renovated Jackie Kennedy’s famous Rose Garden, mowing down flowers in order to literally pave paradise. He gutted the Lincoln bathroom, transforming it from Lyndon B. Johnson’s favorite office into a marble-slathered eyesore, and swapped the historic Palm Room’s lush green tones and tall ferns for white paint and framed photos of plants.

Meanwhile, his administration is doing some demolition of its own, reportedly planning to destroy some 13 historic buildings on the grounds of former psychiatric hospital St. Elizabeths in order to expand facilities for the Department of Homeland Security.

Donald Trump’s so-called “Golden Age” is seriously screwing American workers, according to the latest jobs report.

The U.S. economy added just 50,000 jobs in December, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, underperforming expectations from Wall Street. December’s meager job offerings capped off total job creation in 2025 at roughly 584,000 total jobs, making it the worst year for hiring since the Covid-19 pandemic that ravaged the American economy. 2025 also saw the weakest annual job growth since 2003. 

Since Trump’s Liberation Day tariffs announcement, job growth has screeched to a halt—and may even be in decline, according to economist Justin Wolfers. 

Heather Long, the chief economist for Navy Federal Credit Union, pointed out that the bulk of hiring last year happened in April, when 158,000 jobs were added to the economy. 

The worst month for job creation was October, when the market lost a staggering 173,000 jobs (revised up in the latest release from 105,000) as federal workers ousted by Elon Musk’s DOGE departed their government roles. November gains were also revised down from 64,000 to just 56,000. 

Meanwhile, the unemployment rate fell slightly to 4.4 percent, after reaching its highest rate in four years. The unemployment rate was overall up from 4 percent in January 2025. 

The first year of Trump’s so-called “Golden Age” has been a rough one. 2025 ended with the number of people employed part-time for economic reasons up by 980,000,  the number of long-term unemployed people up by 397,000, and the number of people not in the workforce but wanting a job up 684,000.

National trust in federal authority has plummeted in the wake of several ICE shootings, leading at least two mayors to denounce the government.

Two people in Portland, Oregon, were shot by Border Patrol agents during a traffic stop Thursday evening, leading Mayor Keith Wilson to acknowledge that federal agents have made American towns less safe.

Speaking at a press conference late Thursday, Wilson called on the Department of Homeland Security and ICE to quit “all operations in Portland”—but not before he called out the Trump administration for twisting the reality that Americans are experiencing with their own eyes and ears.

“We know what the federal government says happened here. There was a time when we could take them at their word,” Wilson said. “That time is long past.”

Oregon Governor Tina Kotek was in lockstep, claiming at the same press conference that “federal agents at the direction of the Department of Homeland Security are shattering trust.”

“They are destroying day by day what we hold dear,” Kotek said.

The current status of the two shooting victims is not currently known, according to state and city officials in Oregon.

The shooting occurred just one day after an ICE agent killed 37-year-old Renee Nicole Good in Minneapolis shortly after she dropped off her 6-year-old child to school. Her death sparked national fervor, particularly after the Trump administration vehemently defended the........

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