New plaques on Trump’s ‘Presidential Walk of Fame’ insult, mock former U.S. presidents

President Donald Trump has affixed partisan plaques to the portraits of all U.S. commanders in chief, himself included, on his “Presidential Walk of Fame” at the White House, describing Joe Biden as “sleepy,” Barack Obama as “divisive” and Ronald Reagan as a fan of a young Trump.

The additions, first seen publicly on Wednesday, mark Trump’s latest effort to remake the White House in his own image, while flouting the protocols of how presidents treat their predecessors and doubling down on his determination to reshape how U.S. history is told.

“The plaques are eloquently written descriptions of each President and the legacy they left behind,” White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement describing the installation in the colonnade that runs from the West Wing to the residence. “As a student of history, many were written directly by the President himself.”

Indeed, the descriptions include the president’s typical bombastic language and haphazard capitalization. They also highlight Trump’s fraught relationships with his more recent predecessors.

An introductory plaque tells passersby that the exhibit was “conceived, built, and dedicated by President Donald J. Trump as a tribute to past Presidents, good, bad, and somewhere in the middle.”

Besides the Walk of Fame and its new plaques, Trump has adorned the Oval Office in gold and razed the East Wing in preparation for a massive ballroom. Separately, his administration has pushed for an examination of how Smithsonian exhibits present the nation’s history, and he is playing a strong role in how the federal government will recognize the nation’s 250th anniversary in 2026.

Here’s a look at how Trump’s colonnade exhibit tells the presidential story.

Joe Biden

Joe Biden is still the only president in the display not to be recognized with a gilded portrait. Instead, Trump chose an autopen, reflecting his mockery of Biden’s age and assertions that Biden was not up to the job.

Biden, who defeated Trump in the 2020 election and dropped out of the 2024 election before their pending rematch, is introduced as “Sleepy Joe” and “by far, the worst President in American History.”

Two plaques blast Biden for inflation and his energy and immigration policy, among other things.

Biden’s post-White House office had no comment on his plaque.

Barack Obama

The 44th president is described as “a community organizer, one term Senator from Illinois, and one of the most divisive political figures in American History.”

The plaque calls Obama’s signature domestic achievement “the highly ineffective ‘Unaffordable Care Act.”

An aide to Obama also declined comment.

George W. Bush

George W. Bush, who notably did not speak to Trump when they were last together at former president Jimmy Carter’s funeral, appears to win approval for creating the Department of Homeland Security and leading the nation after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

But the plaque decries that Bush “started wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, both of which should not have happened.”

An aide to Bush didn’t return a message seeking comment.

Bill Clinton

The 42nd president, once a friend of Trump’s, gets faint praise for major crime legislation, an overhaul of the social safety net and balanced budgets.

But his plaque notes Clinton secured those achievements with a Republican Congress, the help of the 1990s “tech boom” and “despite the scandals that plagued his Presidency.”

Clinton’s recognition describes the North American Free Trade Agreement, another of his major achievements, as “bad for the United States” and something Trump would “terminate” during his first presidency. (Trump actually renegotiated some terms with Mexico and Canada but did not scrap the fundamental deal.)

His plaque ends with the line: “In 2016, President Clinton’s wife, Hillary, lost the Presidency to President Donald J. Trump!”

An aide to Clinton did not return a message seeking comment.

Donald Trump

With two presidencies, Trump gets two displays. Each is full of praise and superlatives — “the Greatest Economy in the History of the World.” He calls his 2016 Electoral College margin of 304-227 a “landslide.”

Trump’s second-term plaque notes his popular vote victory — something he did not achieve in 2016 — and concludes with “THE BEST IS YET TO COME.”

Meanwhile, the introductory plaque presumes Trump’s addition will be a White House fixture once he is no longer president: “The Presidential Walk of Fame will long live as a testament and tribute to the Greatness of America.”

Reaction quickly poured in after the plaques were unveiled.

“I spent so much time in the White House,” former vice-president Kamala Harris told Jimmy Kimmel Live on Wednesday night. “The idea that those plaques would have been placed by a president of the United States to talk about former presidents of the United States — the American people deserve better.”

The office of California Gov. Gavin Newsom posted an image on X of Trump appearing to sleep Photoshopped on top of his portrait.

Underneath the photoshopped portrait, the edited description reads: “DONALD IS FINISHED — HE IS NO LONGER ‘HOT.'”