Once a dramatic characteristic of the White House entryway, the official portrait of former President Barack Obama has been moved to a decidedly much less distinguished place, underscoring the yearslong tensions between the forty fourth and forty seventh presidents.
Portraits of different current predecessors with whom President Donald Trump has a contentious relationship, former President George W. Bush and his father, George H. W. Bush, have additionally been moved.
Trump directed employees to transfer the Obama portrait to the highest of the Grand Staircase, two sources acquainted with the matter informed NCS, the place it can now be out of view from 1000’s of holiday makers who tour the White House every day. One of the sources added that the portraits of each Bushes are additionally now within the staircase space.
Multiple sources have stated that the president is immediately concerned with practically the whole lot that’s finished to the aesthetic of the White House, massive or small.
NCS obtained a photograph of the Obama portrait hanging on the prime of the stairwell in a nook, on the touchdown of the doorway to the non-public residence. That space is closely restricted to members of the primary household, US Secret Service brokers, and a restricted variety of White House and govt residence employees. It is firmly out of view for any customer hoping to see the photorealistic Robert McCurdy portray of the previous president, a supply acquainted with the matter confirmed.
It’s not the primary time the Obama portray has been repositioned. In April, the Obama portrait was moved throughout the Grand Foyer of the White House and changed with a portray of an iconic scene of Trump surviving an assassination try in Butler, Pennsylvania.
White House protocol and precedent requires portraits of the newest American presidents to be given essentially the most distinguished placement, within the entrance of the manager mansion, seen to friends throughout official occasions and guests on excursions.
A portrait of former President Joe Biden has not but been accomplished.
The portrait maneuvers marks Trump’s newest slight in opposition to a perceived political rival.
It comes as tensions between the Trump and Obama have escalated in current months. Trump just lately accused Obama and members of his administration of committing treason throughout the 2016 election, prompting a uncommon assertion from his predecessor, whose workplace known as the claims “outrageous,” “bizarre,” and “a weak attempt at distraction.”
The president’s FBI director, Pamela Bondi, subsequently ordered prosecutors to start a grand jury probe into allegations that prime Obama administration officers manufactured intelligence about Russia’s interference within the 2016 election.
There have additionally been long-simmering tensions between Trump and the Bush household. The elder Bush, who died in 2018, known as Trump a “blowhard” in a biography and voted for Hillary Clinton within the 2016 election. George W. Bush, who Trump has attacked as a “failed and uninspiring” president, and former first girl Laura Bush, attended the president’s 2025 inauguration however didn’t attend the post-ceremony luncheon.
NCS has reached out to the White House and the White House Historical Association for remark. A spokesperson for the workplace of former President Obama declined to remark.
During Trump’s first time period, he changed portraits of Bill Clinton and George W. Bush within the Grand Foyer, selecting as an alternative to spotlight William McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt.
Privately funded by the nonprofit White House Historical Association, the formal custom of the presidential portrait got here to be within the early Nineteen Sixties beneath first girl Jacqueline Kennedy, according to former White House curator Betty Monkman. Prior to that, there had been a comparatively “haphazard” coverage, Monkman stated in a 2017 podcast for the affiliation, with the portraits being funded by Congress or commissioned by associates – or by the president himself.
In the trendy period of White House portraits, presidents and first girls have invited their predecessors, former employees and family and friends for unveiling ceremonies.
“It’s a statement of generosity on the current president and first lady to invite all these people from an outgoing administration,” Monkman stated, recalling a ceremony throughout the Johnson administration for Eleanor Roosevelt’s portrait unveiling.