The Taxpayers’ Tab for Donald Trump’s Big Beautiful New Ballroom

When rich people deduct their gifts on their tax returns, we all pay for their generosity

Trump and his Republican sycophants have been busy telling us that we shouldn’t be bothered by Trump’s demolition of the East Wing and his plans for a now $350 million ballroom. (The price tag keeps rising, it had been $200 million.)

While many of us were upset about Trump’s destruction of a historic landmark with zero consultation from anyone, the consolation is supposed to be that taxpayers are not footing the bill. Trump says he is raising the money from his friends and corporate sponsors.

Apparently, we are supposed to be relieved that people seeking favors from Trump are paying for the ballroom rather than taxpayer dollars. As David Dayen pointed out in a piece in The American Prospect, these contributions are likely to prove very costly to the American people.

Dayen goes through the public list of donors (some are anonymous) and found off the bat the big tech companies, Google, Meta, Microsoft, Apple, and Amazon. These companies have all sorts of occasion to seek government contracts and regulatory favors from a Trump administration that has openly said it favors its friends in such matters.

The list includes many other companies looking for favors, such as Hewlitt Packard and Union Pacific, both looking for regulatory approval on major mergers. And then there are crypto folks who always want more love from Donald Trump as they expand their scams.

This naked corruption is the biggest cost to the public from Trump’s big ballroom, but it is not the only one. If we’re only concerned about the budgetary impact, it’s important to remember that taxpayers pay a price for the “generosity” of rich people. They deduct their contributions from their taxable income.

The current top tax rate is roughly 40 percent. (This includes the Medicare tax, which applies to all income of rich people.) If the full $350 million were coming from individuals, this means that we would be getting $140 million less in taxes from them because of their contributions to Trump’s mega ballroom.

From a straight budgetary perspective, the public would be better off if Trump built something more tasteful in the $100-$140 million range, using taxpayer dollars, than the mega MAGA monstrosity he is actually attaching to the White House. (What will this cost to demolish?)

In fairness, many of Trump’s contributions come from corporations who are only taxed at a 21 percent rate. Also, it’s likely that some of Trump’s contributors cheat, and don’t pay any taxes anyhow, so the deduction doesn’t mean anything to them. But none of us should think that just because the ballroom is paid for by contributions, it doesn’t cost the government anything.