The Post spent part of every day in May in the hotel’s bars, restaurants and lobby. What reporters saw ranged from events hosted by foreign groups with policy priorities to Republican glitterati — Rudolph W. Giuliani spoke to two reporters at the hotel that night and assured them he was not a candidate to replace Comey. posing for selfies at the bar the night Trump fired FBI Director James B. Comey; White House aide Omarosa Manigault conferring with the former producer of “The Apprentice”; former Trump campaign adviser Corey Lewandowski plopping into a black leather chair marked “Reserved”; then-press secretary Sean Spicer scrolling through his phone on a plush blue sofa in the lobby.
The parade included out-of-town tourists gawking in the lobby; bartenders hawking $2,500-per-bottle champagne; a light artist at nightfall projecting a protest message on the gray stone facade that read “Pay Trump Bribes Here.”
Trump, as titular leader of the Republican Party, has showcased the hotel as a destination of choice for GOP loyalists.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member