Shutdown hits Trump where he lives
WASHINGTON — The partial government shutdown is hitting home for President Donald Trump in a personal way. He lives in government-run housing, after all.
Just 21 of the roughly 80 people who help care for the White House — from butlers to electricians to chefs — are reporting to work. The rest have been furloughed.
Even so, the shutdown doesn’t mean Trump is making his own bed or emptying the trash on the second floor of the White House, where he and the first lady live with their 12year-old son, Barron.
The short-handed White House residence staff typically includes a butler and a chef. Basic housekeeping continues.
But forget fresh flower arrangements from the White House florist — that’s hardly considered an essential service.
Trump joked this week that because of the skeletal staff, Melania Trump might have had to make salads for members of the championship Clemson football team when they visited the White House on Monday. Instead, he shelled out for a mega order of burgers, fries and pizza for the team.
Still, the slim staffing might be contributing to Trump’s oft-expressed sense of loneliness about life in the White House during the longest closure in history.
“I am all alone (poor me) in the White House waiting for the Democrats to come back and make a deal on desperately needed Border Security,” the president tweeted Christmas Eve.
The shutdown also has thrown cold water on the White House social scene.
Selfies at receptions are out. Public tours of the famed Red, Blue and Green rooms are at a halt.
Until the Clemson players came through this week, Trump had not hosted a large group at the White House since he and the first lady said goodbye to guests at their final holiday reception before Christmas.
Staffing is one reason. But it’s also a matter of optics.
It would look bad for Trump to continue hosting social events while about one-fourth of the executive branch over which he presides has been forced to halt operations.
Congressional leaders and various groups of legislators have come by the White House from time to time to negotiate with Trump.
But in the absence of the larger catering staff, it fell to the Navy-run “mess” in the basement of the West Wing to prepare steak for a small group of Republican House members who recently had lunch with Trump.