Images of Barack Obama and two other former presidents were reportedly put in a hidden stairwell
US President Donald Trump has directed White House staff to move portraits of three former presidents, including Barack Obama, to a staircase where visitors cannot see them, CNN reported on Sunday, citing two sources familiar with the matter.
The reported move comes weeks after Washington began declassifying documents alleging that top officials under then-President Obama worked with intelligence agency heads to support unsubstantiated claims that Russia colluded with Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign.
Two of Trump’s other predecessors were also targeted: 43rd president George W. Bush and his father George H. W. Bush, whose term started in 1989 after he served as vice president during the Ronald Reagan administration. All three portraits were moved to the top of the Grand Staircase, where they will remain out of view of visitors touring the White House, the sources told CNN.
Trump had reportedly feuded with both Bushes for years. The elder Bush, a fellow Republican who passed away in 2018, called the US president a “blowhard” in his biography and supported Democrat Hillary Clinton in 2016.
George W. Bush, whom Trump has described as a “failed and uninspiring” president, and his wife Laura Bush attended the 2025 inauguration but skipped the luncheon afterward.
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The sources also told CNN that Trump is often involved in aesthetic changes of any scale at the White House. The Obama portrait has been relocated before. Earlier this year, it was shifted to a different spot in the White House’s Grand Foyer and replaced with a painting depicting a dramatic scene of Trump surviving an assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania.
There is no legal requirement regarding how portraits of former presidents must be displayed in the White House, but tradition, overseen by the White House Historical Association and the White House curator, generally gives the most prominent placement to the most recent presidents, making them visible to guests during official events and public tours.
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