Donald Trump critics aimed ridicule at the president after he publicly demanded the removal of his portrait at Colorado’s state capitol building, calling it “truly the worst”.
In a post on his Truth Social platform on Sunday, Mr Trump shared an image of the portrait and complained about the painting, saying it was bad and blaming it on Colorado’s governor, Jared Polis – whom the president insulted as being “radically left”.
A Republican admirer of Trump commissioned the portrait.
House Democrats said in a statement on Monday evening that the oil painting would be taken down at the request of Republican leaders in the legislature.
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Senate minority leader Paul Lundeen, a Republican, said that he requested for Trump’s portrait to be taken down and replaced by one “that depicts his contemporary likeness”.
“If the GOP wants to spend time and money on which portrait of Trump hangs in the Capitol, then that’s up to them,” Colorado House Democrats spokesperson Jarrett Freedman said.
“I would much prefer not having a picture than having this one,” Mr Trump wrote in his Truth Social post on Sunday night, and further said the governor “should be ashamed of himself”!
It was unclear what triggered Mr Trump’s tirade about the portrait.
In two follow-up posts, the US president shared separate images of himself in an apparent attempt to distribute photos that he considered more flattering.
Liberal and anti-Trump commentators laughed at the president’s reaction on social media.
On X, Sam Stein of MSNBC wrote that he was “absolutely dying” over how Mr Trump was so upset by his portrait “that he couldn’t resist posting” about it. Stein said it was also funny “how objectively bad the portrait is”.
Former Republican attorney Ron Filipkowski, editor-in-chief of the liberal news website MeidasTouch Network, wrote on X that Trump was “the most fragile, sensitive snowflake in history” while sharing a screenshot of the president’s Truth Social post.
Another social media account named Republicans Against Trump also shared the president’s post while calling him “a petty, insecure baby”.
Mr Trump alleged without evidence that his portrait had been “purposefully distorted”. The president then complained that his Democratic presidential predecessor Barack Obama “looks wonderful” in his portrait at the Colorado capitol.
Despite Mr Trump’s criticism of Polis for the painting, it was unveiled by a Republican group in 2019. A former Republican state senator had crowdfunded nearly $10,000 to commission the painting, according to Colorado news station KUSA.
Mr Trump did not have a portrait hanging in the Colorado state capitol for his first presidency, which began in 2017. In 2018, a liberal political activist placed a large portrait of Vladimir Putin – whom Mr Trump openly admires – in the empty space, but it was quickly removed by capitol staff.
That prompted then Republican state senator Kevin Grantham to raise money through a GoFundMe campaign to hang Mr Trump’s portrait in the state capitol.
A Polis spokesperson told KUSA that the governor was “surprised to learn the president of the United States is an aficionado of our Colorado state capitol and its artwork”.
“We appreciate the president and everyone’s interest in our capitol building and are always looking for any opportunity to improve our visitor experience,” the Polis spokesperson added.
Mr Trump’s Sunday night comments had prompted a steady stream of visitors to pose for photos with the painting before the announcement that it would be taken down. – Guardian, AP
