White House Hangs Tarps Over North Portico Amid Trump's Construction Blitz [View all]

Source: Forbes

BREAKING BUSINESS
White House Hangs Tarps Over North Portico Amid Trump’s Construction Blitz

By Conor Murray, Forbes Staff. Murray is a Forbes news reporter covering entertainment trends.
Jul 09, 2026, 02:06pm EDT

TOPLINE
The White House on Thursday hung large tarps covering the North Portico, printed with images of the columns that are under repair, as the Trump administration ramps up construction and repairs projects across Washington, D.C.


Construction workers hung tarps outside the White House's North Portico on Thursday. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
GETTY IMAGES

KEY FACTS
* Tarps went up on the White House’s North Portico in the late morning on Thursday, covering scaffolding that has stood for days.
* A White House official told CNN the North Portico is “undergoing standard restoration work” to repair stones in the columns, one of several concurrent construction projects taking place at the White House and across Washington.
* Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum told podcast host Katie Miller earlier this week the North Portico columns are undergoing repairs, saying the construction should be finished “very quickly.”
* “President Trump comes out to greet a world leader, sees door dings in the pillars, and he says, ‘Look at all this stuff that needs to be repaired,’” Burgum told Miller.
* Earlier this week, Trump told reporters construction workers have “taken about 150 years of paint off of the columns and re-did them,” saying they were “in very bad shape” and “treated very badly by a lot of presidents."


The tarps are covering scaffolding outside the North Portico. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)
COPYRIGHT 2026 THE ASSOCIATED PRESS. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.


Workers put up a tarp to cover the scaffolding on the North Portico of the White House, Thursday, July 9, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)
COPYRIGHT 2026 THE ASSOCIATED PRESS. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Read more: https://www.forbes.com/sites/conormurray/2026/07/09/white-house-hangs-tarps-over-north-portico-amid-trumps-construction-blitz/