First Lady Melania Trump debuted this year’s White House Christmas decorations for what will likely be the final time Monday, introducing a beautiful display that ignited predictable and characteristic outrage among the usual Trump-deranged culprits.
This year’s decorations feature ornaments dedicated to “paying tribute to the majesty of our great Nation,” Trump wrote on Twitter with the theme titled, “America the Beautiful.”
During this special time of the year, I am delighted to share “America the Beautiful” and pay tribute to the majesty of our great Nation. Together, we celebrate this land we are all proud to call home. #WHChristmas pic.twitter.com/fdZmB3rdXL
— Melania Trump 45 Archived (@FLOTUS45) November 30, 2020
“From coast to coast, our country is blessed with boundless natural wonders,” the White House released in a statement. “The timeless treasures represented in this year’s holiday showcase remind us of the true American spirit. Together, we celebrate this land we are all proud to call home.”
“America the Beautiful” #Christmas at the @WhiteHouse pic.twitter.com/2kCBET7EcL
— Melania Trump 45 Archived (@FLOTUS45) November 30, 2020
https://twitter.com/amber_athey/status/1333405369574567937?s=20
Some however, weren’t so pleased with the display.
After labeling the Republican first lady’s signature white outfit last year as “cold” and “dismissive” despite white being the primary color of the theme, the Trump-resistance Washington Post called this year’s display “bewildering” and described Melania’s introductory video as “a trailer for a movie about a woman who wakes up in a castle one holiday season and goes searching for the person who spiked her eggnog with mushrooms.”
Three paragraphs in to the front-page piece headlined, “Everything we needed to know about Melania Trump is in those bewildering Christmas decorations,” Washington Post columnist Monica Hesse took a victory lap over Trump’s November loss connecting the celebration of women’s suffrage in the display with the president’s defeat among this key group.
“There is a banner celebrating the 19th Amendment,” Hesse wrote, “which now comes across as fourth-dimensional trolling given that the majority of American woman voters used their ballots to eject Melania’s husband from the White House.”
Hesse continued, echoing Post critic Robin Givhan’s grievances from last year that the first lady appeared “cold.”
“In a season meant to celebrate family, friends, community and warmth, Melania always appears alone and very, very cold,” Hesse wrote, which has become routine criticism from those who were never open to warming up to the Trump White House in the first place.
The Post’s hit piece on the first lady reveals far more about the Washington paper, and by extension the media at large, than anything about the former supermodel plagued by pessimistic media coverage because of nothing else other than her marriage to the president.
The Post was by no means alone in airing its usual grievances that a woman in the White House with the last name “Trump” rang in the season with the elegant tradition.
USA Today took the opportunity to re-up comments by the first lady leaked earlier this year where she aired her frustration with liberal outlets constantly criticizing her thankless work of organizing the White House Christmas display.
“Who gives a f-ck about Christmas stuff and decoration?” she asked a close friend who recorded her after years of hostile coverage of her holiday work.
“After controversial Christmas comments, Melania Trump unveils White House holiday decor,” the paper headlined its coverage.
Mashable’s coverage wasn’t much more charitable, calling this year’s display “fine,” followed by a cynical piece ranking the first lady’s four years of decorations.
“We regret to inform Melania Trump that it is once again time to give a f-ck about Christmas,” Mashable wrote, going on to call 2018’s red tree decorations “blood trees,” and renaming 2017’s display “hell on Earth.” Has Ebenezer Scrooge risen from the fictional graveyard to take the reins of the left-wing paper?
It won't matter what Jill Biden's White House Christmas decorations might look like next year. I'm sure they'll be pretty.
But they certainly won't get the same kind of coverage given to Melania Trump's. pic.twitter.com/a06G5bzG7S
— Tristan Justice (@JusticeTristan) November 30, 2020
In a season meant to celebrate family, friends, community and warmth, one can still always rely on legacy outlets to find something unfitting about the Trumps.
