Trump Moved the Portraits of Presidential Obama and Bush to a Hidden Stairwell

Over the course of his time as president, it's fair to say that Donald Trump has had a testy relationship with his predecessors of both parties. He's notoriously not a fan of both George W. Bush and Barack Obama, and Bush and Obama have at various points suggested they would rather he not be president.

Now, new reporting suggests that Trump has moved the official presidential portraits of several of his predecessors to an area where they are no longer visible to the tourists who visit the White House. Here's what we know about that decision.

According to reporting from CNN, Trump ordered the official portraits of Barack Obama, George W. Bush, and George H.W. Bush to be moved to the Grand Staircase, an area that is not visible to the tourists who come to the White House regularly. The report also said that the president has been directly involved in every aesthetic change that has been made to the White House during his second administration.

The area where the portrait is now located is "heavily restricted to members of the first family, U.S. Secret Service agents, and a limited number of White House and executive residence staff," per the report.

This is not the first time that the Obama portrait has been moved. In April, it was moved across the grand foyer of the White House to make room for a portrait of Trump surviving an assassination attempt on the 2024 campaign.

White House protocol generally dictates that the portraits of the most recent presidents receive prominent placement in the executive mansion, which allows them to be visible to guests and tourists. A presidential portrait of Joe Biden has yet to be completed, and it's unclear where it might ultimately be displayed inside the White House once it is done.

The news that Trump moved Obama's official portrait comes after the president accused his predecessor of committing treason during the 2016 election. Following Trump's accusation, Attorney General Pam Bondi ordered a grand jury investigation into whether anyone in the Obama administration had manufactured intelligence about Russian interference in the 2016 election.

To date, there is no evidence that Obama or anyone in his administration manufactured evidence about Russian interference. It's a matter that has been the focus of Trump's since the 2016 election.

During his first administration, Trump replaced the portraits of Bill Clinton and George W. Bush in the Grand Foyer and instead highlighted Teddy Roosevelt and William McKinley.

This move, then, is in line with Trump's broader efforts to change the look of the White House to more closely reflect his worldview. Images of the changes in the Oval Office, which has become much more gold-laminated in the months since Trump took office, have been going viral on social media, yet more evidence of the way the president has worked to transform the building.