Members quit ‘sad’ Mar-a-Lago after Trump loses

“It’s a very despondent place,” said Laurence Leamer, historian and author of “Mar-a-Lago: Inside the Gates of Power at Donald Trump’s Presidential Palace,” MSNBC presenter Alex Witt told “Weekends with Alex Witt” Saturday. . He said members “are not concerned about politics and that the food is not good”.

Leamer said he spoke with some former members who “quietly walked away” after Trump left office.

Trump moved to the Palm Beach, Florida estate last week after his term of office ended. But without the cachet of the incumbent United States president who works on the estate, guests find that Mar-a-Lago has lost a step. There was no on-site entertainment during the pandemic, and Leamer added, “It’s a sad place … it’s not what it was.”

Dissatisfied members can lead to a lower salary for Trump. When Trump was president, many people paid up to $ 200,000 for Mar-a-Lago memberships, Leamer noted, saying they don’t think they will continue to pay that price.

Mar-a-Lago has long been ridiculed by critics as a tough, stuffy club full of Trump memorabilia – some of which are fake. Late night host Jimmy Kimmel told Friday about a visit to the resort just before Trump became president.

“You couldn’t possibly exaggerate how comical it is,” said Kimmel on The Ringer’s “The Bill Simmons Podcast.” “Everyone there is 100 years old.”

Kimmel told Simmons that he had gone to the resort about six years ago to have dinner with Howard Stern, who lived near the property at the time. He described the visitors to Mar-a-Lago as “bent over people eating soft foods,” and said the place is covered in photos of Trump.

“It was just a quiet and awful place,” said Kimmel. “And now he lives in this awful place.”

Trump’s hotels and hospitality businesses were particularly hard hit during the coronavirus pandemic, but sales at the Mar-a-Lago resort rose from $ 21.4 million to $ 24.2 million in the past year. In 2019, the former president moved his permanent residence to the Florida resort from New York’s Trump Tower. But the question remains whether he will be allowed to live there permanently, as it could violate his 1993 agreement with the city of Palm Beach.

“Even here, people don’t like him,” Leamer said, referring to the residents of Palm Beach – many of whom voted for Trump in hopes of lower taxes and a thriving stock market. “It’s just another measure of how his power has diminished.”

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