With a week to go until the 2026 midterm elections, you'd be forgiven for thinking that President Trump and former President Barack Obama were running against each other this year.
While campaigning for Democrats in Ohio over the weekend, Obama mocked the various renovation projects that Trump has been overseeing at the White House, prompting a pointed response from the president and his administration.
"I don't know if you've noticed, but he seems very focused on home renovations," Obama told the crowd in Cleveland. "He should be on HGTV. Guy's building a ballroom that's bigger than the White House. He's paved over the Rose Garden. He's put a helicopter pad on the South Lawn. And there's gold everywhere — what's up with the gold? Everything, more gold. He's got the White House looking like Saddam Hussein opened a Cheesecake Factory."
What else did Obama say?
Obama also skewered the Trump administration for the Lincoln Memorial reflecting pool controversy.
"Remember that whole thing about 'drain the swamp'?" he said. "The only thing that got drained was the reflecting pool in the National Mall after some no-bid contract got it all messed up, and then they tried to blame a three-time Olympian and say he vandalized it."
Obama also taunted Trump for starting a trade war with "that well-known evil empire, Canada."
"I mean, these are the people who gave us maple syrup and Martin Short," Obama said.
But it was the Cheesecake Factory line that seemed to strike a nerve with Trump.
What was Trump's response?
In a Truth Social post hours after Obama spoke, Trump called Obama a "grossly incompetent President" but did not address the Cheesecake Factory comment. On Monday, the White House account on X posted a digitally altered image of the restaurant's menu listing what it described as Trump's accomplishments, saying, "The only thing bigger than the menu is the list of President Trump's accomplishments."
Then on Tuesday, the White House hosted an hourslong YouTube livestream titled "Lo-fi Beats to Dismantle DEI To," featuring a split-screen of what the administration described as Trump's efforts to dismantle DEI and an AI-generated cartoon of the president waving to a crowd of Americans in front of a Cheesecake Factory.
At a campaign rally in Mississippi on Monday, President Trump praised the restaurant chain as "a very successful company" and defended the need for White House renovations — which are projected to cost at least $900 million — while denying that he has spent too much time focusing on them.
"The White House represents our country, and that has to be pristine," Trump said in Corinth, Miss., while stumping for incumbent GOP Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith. "I would try and explain that to a guy like Obama, but he wouldn't understand. He doesn't understand the White House has to be clean, pristine, beautiful. It can't have cracks in the column."
Trump insisted that he had spent "very little time" on redesigning the White House, but also said that he has "fun doing it" and that "it actually relaxes me."
"I do it very good," he said. "I'm really good in real estate and fixing things. I fix things very good, very beautifully and I always build beautiful and inexpensive, which is a good combination if you can do."
Most Americans, though, disapprove of the president devoting his time to such projects. An ABC News/Washington Post poll conducted earlier this month found 59% of U.S. adults say Trump is spending "too much" time on renovating the White House, compared with 27% who say he is spending the right amount of time and 11% who say not enough.
What's at stake?
The president, whose overall approval ratings are near all-time lows, has been out on the campaign trail hoping to help Republicans avert a so-called blue wave and hold on to control of Congress.
In recent stump speeches, Trump has urged would-be voters to pretend he's running to encourage a bigger turnout.
"In this election, if you would, I'm asking you to pretend that I'm on the ballot," he said in Mississippi.
Obama has been out on the trail too. He's seeking to boost Democrats in key races, such as those in Ohio and Michigan, as the party looks to flip both chambers of Congress.
But Trump suggested Obama is campaigning against him.
"He fought me with crooked Hillary [Clinton]. That didn't work out well. Then he fought me with Kamala [Harris]. That didn't work out well," the president said. "And now they say, 'Oh, whoa. Barack Obama is going to start campaigning.' And he's not even campaigning. Tell him he's not campaigning about me. Maybe he'll go home."
This article originally appeared on Yahoo News at https://www.yahoo.com/news/politics/article/how-the-cheesecake-factory-got-dragged-into-a-spat-involving-trump-and-obama-days-before-the-midterms-212002243.html