Deadline Poet / November 11, 2025

The New Ballroom

Calvin Trillin
An excavator works to clear rubble after the East Wing of the White House was demolished. The demolition is part of President Donald Trump’s plan to build a ballroom on the eastern side of the White House.
An excavator works to clear rubble after the East Wing of the White House was demolished. The demolition is part of President Donald Trump’s plan to build a ballroom on the eastern side of the White House. (Eric Lee / Getty Images)

The East Wing was destroyed by night,
But Trump says it will be replaced.
He’s planned a palace, mostly gold—
A shrine to outer-borough taste.

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Even before February 28, the reasons for Donald Trump’s imploding approval rating were abundantly clear: untrammeled corruption and personal enrichment to the tune of billions of dollars during an affordability crisis, a foreign policy guided only by his own derelict sense of morality, and the deployment of a murderous campaign of occupation, detention, and deportation on American streets. 

Now an undeclared, unauthorized, unpopular, and unconstitutional war of aggression against Iran has spread like wildfire through the region and into Europe. A new “forever war”—with an ever-increasing likelihood of American troops on the ground—may very well be upon us.  

As we’ve seen over and over, this administration uses lies, misdirection, and attempts to flood the zone to justify its abuses of power at home and abroad. Just as Trump, Marco Rubio, and Pete Hegseth offer erratic and contradictory rationales for the attacks on Iran, the administration is also spreading the lie that the upcoming midterm elections are under threat from noncitizens on voter rolls. When these lies go unchecked, they become the basis for further authoritarian encroachment and war. 

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Calvin Trillin

Calvin Trillin is The Nation’s “deadline poet.”

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