Why Donald Trump Wants To Replace American History With Big Statues Of Famous People

As the nation marked its 250th anniversary this summer, Donald Trump could not stop posting AI-generated images of himself alongside George Washington. In one, Trump and Washington ride horses through a bucolic landscape, the sun setting in the distance. In another, Trump saves Washington from falling off a cliff; this one is styled as a movie poster for a time-traveling buddy cop film. These are in addition to the very real images of Washington’s and Trump’s faces hanging side by side on massive banners outside the Department of Interior building.

More than any others though, Trump posted images of him and George Washington in the proposed White House ballroom. There’s one in which Trump holds rolled up architectural plans (in an already-completed ballroom) while pointing out some distant feature to George. In another they both stand in the ballroom staring directly at the camera; even from the front you can tell they’ve both adopted Trump’s signature ass-out posture. There are at least five different versions of this particular scene.

Trump’s insistence on posting images of himself alongside George Washington offers the perfect distillation of how he thinks about history. For him, history is synonymous with celebrity—and there could be no higher honor for our historical VIPs to be feted in Trump’s glimmering new ballroom. Unwilling, for obvious reasons, to wait for history’s judgment, Trump uses AI to place himself alongside the past’s most famous figures.