Trump brags about his White House ballroom and seeks to deflect blame for GOP midterm drubbing

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump reacted Wednesday to Republicans' midterm election losses by showing off the White House ballroom he's building as he demonstrated the kind of detached behavior that voters around the country said was a key reason they opted to punish his party.

In an extraordinary scene, Trump summoned reporters to the hulking construction site that he demolished the East Wing to make room for and the Republican president spoke for nearly 20 minutes about minute building details. He did not mention his party losing control of Congress after defeats in some of the country's deepest GOP strongholds, including Texas and South Carolina, or voter concerns about the high cost of living and federal corruption that helped cause the election losses.

“This has been a structure the likes of which has never been seen anywhere,” Trump said, speaking into a microphone that sent loud feedback echoing around the cavernous space.

He talked at length about how the ballroom would be the ”safest place in Washington" upon completion, stretching five stories underground and featuring a cut of marble that he called “a vein that people have been after for 50 years.”

“We have large staircases coming from the kitchen. If I put the kitchen on top, you would lose three walls, because a kitchen takes about 30% of the space,” Trump said of his choice to make the ballroom's kitchen subterranean.

“It’s going to be top of the line," he added.

Presidents usually speak with reporters the day after the midterms. It's normal for those whose party endured big losses to shoulder publicly at least part of the responsibility.

But not Trump.

He began the day with a schedule that showed only private meetings, then suggested he had decided at the last minute to invite the press to watch as the final steel beam — topped with a small evergreen tree symbolizing growth and luck — was hoisted into place on the ballroom roof.

Trump signed the beam with a marker during the ceremony, writing “Love!” followed by his name in supersize letters.

His appearance came after midterm voters said they thought the president was focused on the wrong issues. About two-thirds of voters said Trump does not have the right priorities, according to The AP Voter Poll, and the overwhelming majority of these voters supported Democratic House candidates.

The post-midterm ceremony might also reinforce voter concerns about whether Trump, 80, is up for the rigors of the presidency.

Biden dropped out of his reelection race in 2024 after a disastrous debate with Trump, who even today frequently mocks Biden's mental and physical acuity.

Trump eventually took questions at the ballroom site and attempted to duck responsibility for the broad Republican losses. He insisted he didn't lead the party into an Election Day drubbing despite staging a flurry of rallies where he implored supporters to pretend that he was on the ballot.

"If I were on the ballot I would have won,” Trump insisted.

He said campaign rallies in mostly Republican states or conservative parts of more closely divided ones featured enthusiastic crowds “but we weren’t able to transfer love to the candidates.”

The beam-raising was not his first baffling political moment this week. On Monday, Trump gave his closing message of the midterm cycle in a long speech at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, shining a spotlight at a pivotal time on a project marred by algae, leaks and delays.

“I heard it was a very good speech, got great reviews,” he said on Wednesday.

An Associated Press analysis of the 39 Trump speeches and rallies that Trump staged between Sept. 1 and Election Day showed the president used phrasing suggesting he was on the ballot in 30 of them. In some addresses he returned to the subject more than once, though, meaning there were at least 40 instances where he appealed to voters to engage in that bit of make-believe.

But as the extent of his party's defeat became apparent on election night, Trump was deflecting blame.

“I don’t like to consider it a defeat for me. I wasn’t on the ballot,” he told Fox News Channel. Voters, he said, just “didn’t like the candidates” on the ballot. The Voter Poll suggests Trump himself was a drag on GOP politicians and that in some races, candidates were seen as too supportive of the unpopular president.

Trump has a long history of passing the buck, on issues large and small, especially when there are ballot-box failures.

After Republicans lost the House in the 2018 midterms during Trump's first term, he blamed defeated members of his own party.

Utah Rep. Mia Love, who had tried to distance herself from him, “gave me no love, but then she lost. Too bad," the president said, while also mocking other losing lawmakers for not embracing him — Florida's Carlos Curbelo, Colorado's Mike Coffman, Virginia's Barbara Comstock, and Illinois' Peter Roskam.

That's in contrast to how Democrat Barack Obama described his party's losses in 2010 as “a shellacking" or Republican George W. Bush described Democratic victories in the 2006 midterms as “a thumping.”

But Trump, known for defying all kinds of presidential norms, began laying the groundwork for avoiding blame this cycle well before balloting began.

He told Punchbowl News in August that voters were angry at Republicans “but they’re not angry at me.”

The president posted on his social media site last month that should Texas Republican Senate candidate Ken Paxton lose — and he did — "it will be because of WEAK and INEFFECTIVE Political Hacks like John Cornyn and Karl Rove.” That's despite Trump's risky endorsement of scandal-marred Paxton in the primary over incumbent Cornyn, who first got to the Senate in 2002 and was considered the safer bet. Rove is a political strategist who helped Bush win the White House.

Also losing Tuesday was Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, a longtime Trump ally.

Trump posted on social media that if Abbott “hadn’t become a RINO in the last six months of his Political Life, he wouldn’t have lost," suggesting the governor had backed away from his staunchly conservative credentials and become “Republican in Name Only.”

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Associated Press writers Amelia Thomson DeVeaux, Linley Sanders, Josh Boak and Aaron Kessler contributed to this report.

President Donald Trump talks with construction workers at the White House Ballroom at the White House, Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

President Donald Trump talks to reporters during a tour of White House Ballroom construction at the White House, Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

President Donald Trump signs the final steel beam before it is placed during construction for the White House Ballroom at the White House, Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

President Donald Trump talks to reporters during a tour of White House Ballroom construction at the White House, Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

President Donald Trump talks to reporters during a tour of White House Ballroom construction at the White House, Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

President Donald Trump speaks during a tour of the White House Ballroom construction at the White House, Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

President Donald Trump talks to reporters during a tour of White House Ballroom construction at the White House, Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

President Donald Trump speaks during a tour of the White House Ballroom construction at the White House, Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

President Donald Trump speaks during a tour of the White House Ballroom construction at the White House, Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

President Donald Trump speaks during a tour of the White House Ballroom construction at the White House, Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

President Donald Trump talks to reporters during a tour of White House Ballroom construction at the White House, Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

President Donald Trump signs a steel beam at the White House Ballroom construction site at the White House, Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

President Donald Trump speaks during a tour of construction of the White House ballroom, Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

President Donald Trump speaks during a tour of the White House Ballroom construction at the White House, Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026, in Washington, as Interior Secretary Doug Burgum listens at right. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott speaks to supporters at an election night event in Austin, Texas, Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026. (AP Photo/ David J. Phillip)

President Donald Trump talks with Senate candidate Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton at a campaign rally at Lubbock Memorial Civic Center, Tuesday, Oct. 27, 2026, in Lubbock, Texas. (AP Photo/Annie Rice)

President Donald Trump stands on stage after speaking at a campaign rally at the Salina Regional Airport, Sunday, Nov. 1, 2026, in Salina Kan. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)

WASHINGTON (AP) — At the urging of President Donald Trump, Republicans in eight states redrew the boundaries of dozens of congressional districts over the past year while angling for an edge that could help them hold onto a slim House majority in a tough midterm election.

Ultimately, it didn't work.

Republicans lost most of the Democratic-held seats they had targeted to flip, lost others they had banked on retaining and got swept out of power by a Democratic surge fueled by voter dissatisfaction with Trump, the economy and the war with Iran.

The Republican redistricting plan fell flat in Alabama, Florida and Texas. It got scuttled by courts in Missouri and then firmly defeated by its voters Tuesday. And it got offset in California, where a retaliatory Democratic redistricting flipped all five of the Republican-held seats it targeted.

“This is a catastrophic rebuke of Donald Trump’s failed effort to gerrymander the country into oblivion to save the U.S. House of Representatives for himself," John Bisognano, president of the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, said Wednesday.

Congressional voting districts typically are redrawn after a census at the start of each decade to account for population changes. But Trump spurred an unusual mid-decade redistricting battle last year when he urged Texas Republicans to reshape U.S. House districts to give the GOP a shot at winning five additional seats in the midterm election.

A cascade of redistricting followed, spurred along in the South by a Supreme Court ruling that weakened federal Voting Rights Act protections for majority Black districts. Republicans hoped their redistricting could net as many as four more seats in Florida, two in Ohio and one each in Alabama, Louisiana, North Carolina and Tennessee.

In all but one of those revamped districts, Trump would have carried over 54% of the vote had they been in place for the 2024 election, according to Associated Press estimates.

“In normal times, that sort of district is relatively safe,” said Justin Levitt, a professor at the Loyola Law School in Los Angeles who runs the “All About Redistricting” website.

But the presumed Republican districts got undercut by shifting viewpoints of Trump. The AP Voter Poll found about 6 in 10 disapprove of how Trump is handling the presidency. Views of Trump’s priorities also were mostly negative.

“If we look across the country, that entire mid-decade redistricting gambit was a complete bust for Republicans,” said Mark Jones, a political science professor at Rice University in Houston.

In Texas, Republicans reconfigured three heavily Latino districts in the Rio Grande Valley, which had shifted toward Trump in 2024, to try to boost their chances of unseating Democratic Reps. Henry Cuellar and Vicente Gonzalez. But both won reelection Tuesday. And Democrats instead unseated Republican Rep. Monica De La Cruz, whose district is sandwiched between theirs.

Though De La Cruz's new district retained the same percentage of Trump-inclined voters as the 2024 version, about 3 in 5 voting-age residents were new — making it harder for her to compete against Democratic challenger Bobby Pulido, a well-known Latin Grammy award winner.

The AP Voter Poll indicates a substantial shift in Hispanics moving away from Republicans compared with Trump’s victory just two years ago. Nationally about one-third of Hispanics say they backed the Republican in their local U.S. House race, while roughly 4 in 10 voted for Trump two years ago.

The new Texas districts were drawn by Adam Kincaid, executive director of the National Republican Redistricting Trust.

“Trying to pick up five seats in Texas, without putting anything else in serious jeopardy, it was a Herculean task,” Kincaid said Wednesday. He added: “It required the trends that we had been seeing over the past several years to continue, and that did not happen.”

Had Republicans not redrawn the Texas districts, however, they likely would have lost even more seats, Kincaid said.

Republicans in Florida tried to tilt four more House seats to the GOP in Trump’s adopted home state. Democratic Rep. Jared Moskowitz was among their targets, but he decided to run anyway in one of the redrawn districts. He won reelection Tuesday.

“I’ve worked across the aisle. I’ve delivered results for my community, and they spent $26 million trying to beat me,” Moskowitz said after his victory in Florida’s 25th Congressional District. “They lit that money on fire tonight.”

He said voters in his new district, like those nationwide, were most concerned about the economy and their ability to afford a good quality of life. But he said that redistricting angered voters, too.

After redistricting, about two-thirds of voting-age residents were new to the district represented by Democratic Rep. Kathy Castor. But she also won reelection. Democrat Pia Dandiya won yet another district -- an open seat in southern Florida — that Republicans had reshaped for an advantage.

In Alabama, a Supreme Court ruling allowed the Republican-led Legislature to revert to what the GOP considered to be a friendlier map. But Democratic Rep. Shomari Figures won reelection anyway, defying Republicans' plans.

Republicans redrew two congressional districts in eastern North Carolina with a goal of unseating Democratic Rep. Don Davis in the 1st Congressional District, which has sent a Black member to Congress for more than 30 years. They made Davis' district a bit more Republican by bringing in thousands of voters from the 3rd Congressional District, held by Republican Rep. Greg Murphy. In exchange, they reassigned thousands of voters in Democratic-leaning areas to Murphy's district.

The ensuing advertising battle for Davis' seat cost well over $50 million, according to the ad-tracking firm AdImpact, ranking among the most expensive House races nationally.

Davis held a slight lead Wednesday, and the race between Murphy and Democratic challenger Raymond Smith was particularly close.

What started as a Republican redistricting effort could become a Democratic redistricting movement ahead of the presidential election.

Maryland voters on Tuesday approved a constitutional amendment that will make it easier for the state's Democratic-led General Assembly to redraw districts to the party's advantage. Democratic proponents, backed by former President Barack Obama, have touted it as a way to “stop Trump.”

Democrats who made gains in numerous state legislatures Tuesday also could use that power for redistricting — most notably in Wisconsin, where districts were tilted toward Republicans. And Democratic lawmakers in New York already have taken an initial step toward congressional redistricting before the 2028 elections.

But the recent midterm redistricting revealed it can be difficult to anticipate voter behavior when trying to gerrymander districts for partisan advantage. That could particularly be the case for the next presidential election, which would be the first in a dozen years without Trump's name atop the ballot, making it hard to know how his supporters would realign behind new candidates.

The midterm election "shows districts aren’t destiny – that if voters actually show up, they can overcome district lines,” Levitt said.

Associated Press writer Bill Barrow contributed to this report.

Santiago Rivera paints on a sign outside a polling place after casting his ballot on Election Day during the midterm election Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026, in Clayton, Mo. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)

Rep. Shomari Figures, D-Ala., mingles with supporters at an election night event, Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026, in Montgomery, Ala. (AP Photo/Vasha Hunt)

Democratic House candidate Bobby Pulido arrives at a polling location at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley's Student Academic Center on Election Day, Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2026, in Edinburg, Texas. (Raquel Natalicchio/Houston Chronicle via AP)