Inside Trump’s Oval Office 2.0 - a sneak peek
A tray of pens was on the Resolute Desk to sign executive orders, and the valet button used for ordering Diet Cokes back in place. The most exclusive office in the US was ready for business.
President Trump’s redecorated Oval Office includes a portrait of Benjamin Franklin and a fresh Andrew Jackson painting, part of an Inauguration Day overhaul of the most exclusive office space in America.
On Monday, about 3.30pm, shortly after Trump was sworn into office, Trump’s aides gave The Wall Street Journal and a photographer an exclusive peek into the office.
A tray of pens was ready on the Resolute Desk for Trump to sign executive orders.
A valet button that Trump famously used to order Diet Cokes was set up and ready to go.
Like four years ago, a portrait of George Washington now hangs over the fireplace, which is flanked by portraits of Alexander Hamilton, the country’s first Treasury secretary, and Thomas Jefferson, the country’s third president.
A bust of Winston Churchill rests on a table near the fireplace, sitting in the same spot Trump originally had it before President Biden moved it out of the Oval Office when he took office in 2021.
A bust of Martin Luther King Jr, whose likeness both Biden and Trump displayed in the Oval Office, remains.
There are also new silver eagle figures over the fireplace on the mantel.
The Oval Office is perhaps the most iconic setting in the White House, designed to convey the grandeur and the might of the presidency to the world.
It is the setting for meetings with foreign heads of state, brass tacks talks with congressional leaders and where presidents address the nation in particularly historic moments.
“We love the Oval Office,” Trump said on Monday during an appearance at Capital One Arena in downtown Washington.
“The wars start and end there. Everything starts and ends at the Oval Office.”
Unlike in other working meeting rooms in the White House complex, presidents tend to personalise the office, selecting art and artefacts that emphasise their values and the goals of their administration.
When each new president takes power, their freshly made-over office serves as a reminder of the change in administrations.
The Trump 2.0 version of Jackson’s portrait hails from the White House art collection.
In his first term, Trump had a portrait of the seventh president that was on loan from the US Naval Academy, a White House aide explained.
Biden brought the Benjamin Franklin portrait into the Oval Office to signify his focus on science. And Trump kept it.
Redecorating the Oval Office during a transition of presidential power occurs in just hours. Staff made changes when Biden was still in the building.
By 10.58am, the blue rug that Biden used had been swapped out for a more neutral one that Trump previously had in his Oval Office.
Pieces of the massive Resolute Desk had to be disassembled so the rug could be placed under it, White House aides said.
Other presidents, including Ronald Reagan, have hung Jackson’s likeness in their Oval Offices.
But Trump is particularly fond of Jackson, who also rose to power on a populist, antiestablishment wave and then remade his party into his own image.
At times, the painting made its own headlines: In 2017 some Native American leaders were miffed that the portrait of Jackson, whose actions in office led to forced relocations of Indians that led to thousands of deaths, was the backdrop of an Oval Office ceremony where Trump honoured Navajo Code Talkers.
Sitting under the painting of Jackson is a sculpture called “The Bronco Buster” by Frederic Remington, which also graced Trump’s first Oval Office.
Trump swapped out a bust of Robert F. Kennedy that Biden kept in a prominent spot near the fireplace, where it was frequently photographed behind Biden.
However, the Kennedy family isn’t excised from the government: Trump’s cabinet is set to include Kennedy’s son, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who Trump has picked to lead the Department of Health and Human Services.
Military flags for each service branch have been put back in the Oval Office – they were removed during Biden’s term.
Like most presidents, both Biden and Trump used the Resolute Desk, an 1880 gift from Queen Victoria to President Rutherford B. Hayes – so there is no change there.
It is made of white oak and mahogany timbers from HMS Resolute, a British naval ship used for Arctic exploration.
When Biden moved in in 2021, he kept the gold curtains that Trump used for his first term, so those didn’t need to be swapped out.
Framed photos of members of Trump’s family sit on a small table near the Resolute Desk, including one of his eldest three children in formal evening wear.
Another shows him with his daughter Ivanka when she was a girl. And there is an image of Trump with his wife, Melania, holding their son Barron when he was a baby.
Bookshelves included volumes by American novelist Nathaniel Hawthorne.
Earlier in the day aides took down jumbo photos that hung on the walls in some West Wing hallways, leaving empty gold-coloured frames on the walls awaiting Trump-themed images.
When Biden came to power, he tasked his brother James along with the historian Jon Meacham with bringing artefacts into the office that were meaningful.
They included a massive portrait of progressive hero President Franklin D. Roosevelt that Biden hung over the fireplace to symbolise a moment when the country faced multiple crises. That is gone.
Presidents can select art from the White House’s collection, the vast holdings in the Smithsonian or ask to borrow works from other institutions.
But even the most powerful man in the world must make concessions:
The curved walls in the Oval Office mean that there is a practical size limit on what art can comfortably be hung without it looking awkward, previous designers said.
Trump’s Oval Office, and much of the West Wing, was refreshed a few months into Trump’s first term.
The striped wallpaper that adorned the walls during Barack Obama’s time in office was replaced with a white patterned wall covering that Trump selected himself. That remains.
Beyond the paintings and statues, presidents often add other touches that are revealing.
Obama liked to have a bowl of apples on a coffee table near the fireplace. Biden kept chocolate-chip cookies on hand outside the Oval Office.
On Monday, that table included a bouquet of flowers along with a square gold paperweight embossed with the word Trump.
The Wall Street Journal
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