Newsom
trolls ‘Marie Antoinette’ Trump over decision to protect his ballroom while
pushing cuts: ‘No health care for you’
California
governor’s press office compares president to the French aristocrat in a
humorous tweet
Mike
Bedigan
Thursday
02 October 2025 09:09 BST
Gavin
Newsom has trolled Donald Trump over the news that work will continue on his
presidential ballroom through the government shutdown, comparing him to the
historical French queen Marie Antoinette.
“TRUMP
‘MARIE ANTOINETTE’ SAYS, ‘NO HEALTH CARE FOR YOU PEASANTS, BUT A BALLROOM FOR
THE QUEEN!’ the California governor’s press office wrote on X (Twitter),
alongside an AI-generated picture.
The image
shows Trump dressed in the 18th-century dress and wig of the French aristocracy
as worn by Marie Antoinette, who became a symbol of selfish luxury at a time
when her people were going hungry. Newsom has parodied the president’s
trademark all-caps posts many times previously.
The
Governor’s most recent dig comes after it was revealed that work would continue
on Trump’s new White House ballroom despite the shuttering of multiple federal
agencies due to the impasse between Republicans and Democrats on a proposed
spending bill.
Democrats
have demanded the reversal of cuts to Medicaid, set out earlier this year in
Trump’s “One Big, Beautiful, Bill,” and an extension of Affordable Care Act
subsidies.
Marie
Antoinette, the queen of France at the time of the French Revolution in 1789,
is associated with one of history’s most famous quotes — “Let them eat cake” —
which is said to have been her response to being told that her starving peasant
subjects had no bread to eat.
Cake was
more expensive than bread at the time, and the story is used to highlight the
obliviousness of the aristocracy to the plight of the common people. However,
historians say it is unlikely that the queen — who was eventually beheaded by
revolutionaries — ever said those exact words.
It is
reported that Trump’s ballroom will cost $200m to construct. Work on the
project will not be stopped, because its funding is not connected to the 2026
financial year enacted appropriation, sources told Fox News.
This is
despite warnings from Democrats that both Trump’s bill and a prolonged shutdown
will have dire effects on healthcare for many Americans.
As of
Wednesday evening, the shutdown was expected to continue as no votes on
spending bills are expected until Friday, and senators are leaving Washington
D.C. until then, CNN reports.
The Trump
administration continues to lay the blame squarely at the feet of the
Democrats, with Vice President JD Vance accusing his rival party of taking the
country “hostage.”
“What you
don’t do is say, ‘Unless you do exactly as we want to do as congressional
Democrats, we’re taking a hostage’ — and the hostage, it turns out, is critical
essential services that the American people need,” Vance said Wednesday.
Trump is
known to be excited about his ballroom. When asked how he was coping with the
assassination of his friend Charlie Kirk last month, the president immediately
switched the subject to the construction project, saying: “I think very good.
And by the way, right there you see all the trucks. They just started
construction of the new ballroom for the White House, which is something
they’ve been trying to get for about 150 years. And it’s gonna be a beauty.
It’ll be an absolutely magnificent structure.”
In his
final monologue before being suspended, late-night talk-show host Jimmy Kimmel
mocked Trump’s response, quipping that the president was “at the fourth stage
of grief: construction.”
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