President Donald Trump arrived at the State Department on Friday with billions of dollars in mining investments to announce.
Nearly 200 industry executives gathered to hear how his administration planned to strengthen American mineral production.
The president opened the roundtable in the Benjamin Franklin State Dining Room largely on message.
He touted what the White House described as billions of federal dollars in mining investments as well as $180 million in grants for mining schools.
“I’m delighted to be here at the Department of State to announce some of the largest ever investments in American mining,” Trump said in his opening.
It didn’t take long for the leader of the free world to become distracted by something that had nothing to do with what he was there for.
The president began looking around the ornate room.
Trump gets distracted by the room's decor:
"The president's allowed to remove things from any building. I'm liking the chandeliers… I'm liking these Corinthian columns" pic.twitter.com/luiqDSxFYd
— FactPost (@factpostnews) August 7, 2026
Quickly, he began admiring the décor and explaining that his office apparently gave him the authority to take whatever caught his eye.
“It’s a beautiful building, but — you know, I look at — the president’s allowed to remove things from any building, and I’m liking the chandeliers,” Trump said. “I really — I like those Corinthian columns, but I don’t know. Cutting them out may not be good.”
He wasn’t finished.
“Those are beautiful columns, but I’m allowed to do it,” Trump continued. “Every once in a while, I’ll come in here and grab a painting and put it at the Oval Office. Right? But not too much.”
The comments stood out considering where Trump was sitting.
According to Raw Story, the State Department’s Diplomatic Reception Rooms hold more than 5,000 pieces of American art and artifacts. The collection, largely built through private donations, is valued at more than $90 million.
Online critics quickly pounced on Trump’s detour.
“Trump joking about taking chandeliers and paintings from the State Department during a mining roundtable is certainly a way to open the meeting,” one X user posted. Another wrote, “Grandpa is lost again. His handlers need to step in.”
Someone else challenged Trump’s description of his presidential authority: “No, a king is. A president is a renter the People’s House.”
“Worst decor of a white house. This man has no plans of leaving,” a fourth comment read, while another joked, “Getting ready to steal things before the impeachment.”
“Everything Trump touches ends up looking like a gilded whorehouse. No offense to sexworkers,” one critic quipped. Another simply wrote, “He’s stealing anything he can move.”
One critic focused on Trump’s wandering attention: “It shows you how little interest he has in the topic at hand.”
But the president’s comments weren’t exactly unprecedented.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent previously told Fox News host Jesse Watters that Trump personally requested a treasured Alexander Hamilton portrait from the Treasury Department.
“Mr. Bessent, I’d like to take some things from the Treasury Department and bring them to the White House,” Bessent recalled Trump telling him.
The reproduction of John Trumbull’s famous portrait of Hamilton — the first Treasury secretary — once hung outside Bessent’s office. It was later moved to the Roosevelt Room.
“So the president sent over some beautiful gold gilt for my office,” Bessent said. “So it wasn’t exactly an even trade.”
Watters joked that Trump “usually comes out on top.” Bessent quickly corrected him: “Not usually—always!”
Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s grandfather clock apparently caught Trump’s eye back in June, too.
TIMELY UPGRADE: @POTUS jokes he “commandeered” Secretary of State Rubio’s clock for the Cabinet Room! pic.twitter.com/QA4UNiECpX
— FOX & Friends (@foxandfriends) July 9, 2025
“So as president, you have the power—if I go into the State Department, or Department of Commerce or Treasury—if I see anything that I like, I’m allowed to take it,” Trump said.
He recalled telling Rubio, “Marco, I have the right to do it.”
By the end of Friday’s event, Rubio seemingly knew where the conversation might go.
“Thank you for coming to the State Department. We like this room a lot too, and obviously don’t look back. There’s a painting up here. Just don’t — uh-oh,” Rubio said.
Trump immediately took the bait.
“I like that. That’s a good one. I’m taking it with me,” he replied.
Rubio responded: “I shouldn’t have said anything.”
The exchange gave Trump’s online critics even more ammunition. “Trump takes ‘because he can.’ That’s the way he feels about our country, too. No, even the world,” one comment on Newsbreak said at the time.
Somewhere beneath the chandeliers, Corinthian columns, paintings and presidential commentary was the day’s actual official business. The White House promised more than $3 billion in federal investments to mining firms, mostly from the Department of Defense’s Office of Strategic Capital.
Unfortunately, that’s not what made headlines. Trump’s wandering eye seems to have become the part of the mining roundtable people remembered most.
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