\u201cThirty years ago, every element of that sentence would have sounded completely insane,\u201d Oliver said, before quoting the 79-year-old president who said in the past that people are \u201cloving\u201d his plan to demolish the wing and have wanted a White House ballroom for 150 years\u2014but that \u201cthere\u2019s never been a president that\u2019s good at ballrooms.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"NEW](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/W5IZ5RMRLJG6DHBNUJKKZ4EIMM.jpg\")
John Oliver hosted Comic Relief Live 2025 in New York City, poking fun at Trump’s ballroom. Roy Rochlin\/Roy Rochlin\/Getty Images for Comic Relief <\/p>\n
\u201cNobody gives a f— about ballrooms, apart from people who like ballrooms\u2026 who are all a—–es,\u201d Oliver said, prompting laughter in the crowd. <\/p>\n
Trump\u2019s proposed ballroom project has only grown in price and size. In July, when the construction was first announced, it was priced at $200 million, with a planned footprint of 90,000 square feet and seating for 600 people. The gilded project is now $100 million over budget<\/a> and expected to seat 900.<\/p>\n Despite the president\u2019s claim that the ballroom is something \u201cneeded and desired,\u201d public support for its construction is sharply divided along partisan lines<\/a>, with a large majority of Americans strongly disapproving <\/a>of demolishing the East Wing to build it.<\/p>\n Before its teardown, the East Wing traditionally housed the Office of the First Lady. According to the Wall Street Journal, Melania Trump, 55, \u201cprivately raised concerns\u201d<\/a> about its demolition, with even her husband noting that she \u201cloved her tiny office.\u201d However, she now calls the demolition \u201cgreat.\u201d<\/p>\n As the Comic Relief night went on, comedian Trevor Noah\u2014who received an honor for his foundation and was presented with his award by Mexican-born Kenyan actress Lupita Nyong\u2019o\u2014mentioned the first lady, whose East Wing is being demolished.<\/p>\n \u201cThey told me\u2026 we have a surprise for you, a very successful immigrant woman is going to present,\u201d Noah said, before adding, \u201cI was like, oh my God, Melania\u2019s coming,\u201d joking that he was disappointed to find out it was Nyong\u2019o who presented the award\u2014\u201cjust someone who played a prisoner.\u201d <\/p>\n Noah went on to say that he felt fortunate the Trevor Noah Foundation, which was honored that night, wasn\u2019t affected by the Trump administration\u2019s sudden cut to USAID\u2014a move that left many children in other countries without the food they needed, and in some cases, cost lives.<\/a> <\/p>\n The Comic Relief event highlighted the urgency of ending child poverty, with comedians using laughter to remind the crowd that the cause is more important than ever.<\/p>\n As The Daily Show star Ronny Chieng put it during the event, these are times when the \u201cvibes\u201d are \u201coff.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"John Oliver poked fun at President Donald Trump\u2019s $300 million ballroom at an event highlighting that 12 million…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":441419,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[185,203644,77,171,53747,203645,181253,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-441418","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-celebrities","9":"tag-comic-relief","10":"tag-donald-j-trump","11":"tag-entertainment","12":"tag-john-oliver","13":"tag-lupita-nyongo","14":"tag-trevor-noah","15":"tag-united-states","16":"tag-unitedstates","17":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115704206186325930","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/441418","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=441418"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/441418\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/441419"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=441418"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=441418"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=441418"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"President](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/RSUX5R6H6FDTPDMTRFFSH6FMCA.jpg\")
President Donald Trump’s new ballroom will cost $300 million. The Washington Post\/The Washington Post via Getty Im <\/p>\n![\"NEW](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/AWZVY7RUIRANXLVRDBSWN6Q2WU.jpg\")
Trevor Noah joked that he thought the “very successful immigrant woman” presenting his reward would be Melania Trump. Noam Galai\/Noam Galai\/Getty Images for Comic Relief <\/p>\n