As the second Trump Administration moved into the nation’s capital earlier this year, many young people with deep Alabama ties earned coveted staff positions or appointments within the executive branch, but to one Alabama-turned-Washington man, the transfer of political power is a spectacle he is comfortable with watching from a distance — or, at least, from across the street.
Stewart McLaurin, President of the White House Historical Association (WHHA), heads the nonpartisan nonprofit charged with preserving the history and telling the story of the Executive Mansion, and, as he will often note, he does it without a single cent of taxpayer money.
McLaurin was raised in Birmingham and graduated from the University of Alabama in 1981 with degrees in American History and Political Science before beginning a career that would eventually land him in Decatur House, a historic brick home on the northwest corner of Lafayette Square that now houses the Association.
“I knew I was interested in history and was interested in things in Washington,” McLaurin said of his childhood fascination with American history in an interview with Yellowhammer News.
“I, of course, had the opportunity to intern here, and even prior to that, I had made my first visit to Washington in the fifth grade and saw the White House, the Capitol, Mount Vernon, the Supreme Court, and I had a much better understanding of the importance of the place and context of where these people worked.”
“I knew that I was interested in these things, but yet, I never dreamed that I would one day have the opportunity to work so closely and collaboratively with a series of presidents and first ladies, and that’s been a real privilege.”
Since his 2014 appointment to lead the Association, McLaurin has worked with three presidents and first ladies across four administrations, all of whom he says have shown a good deal of interest in the house and its history.
“I can honestly say the ones that I’ve worked with have really cared about the house and respected the house and added things to it. Some were more decorative types of elements. Some really cared about the preservation of the house,” McLaurin said.
“In the first Trump presidency, Mrs. Trump was very interested in the historical integrity of the house, and there were some things that just really needed to be done – even though it was an inconvenience to the family – and she encouraged us to do those projects, and we did.”
Although the WHHA is not federally funded, it is responsible for the acquisition and upkeep of much of the White House’s permanent collection that includes furniture, artwork, and china, among other pieces. The Association also funds the portraits of presidents and first ladies that occupy the walls of the house.
Although Americans have been able to tour the White House for centuries, high demand and modern security measures naturally limit the number of people who will ever have the chance to set foot in the building. So, to cater to those who may never be so lucky, the White House Historical Association recently took on a mammoth project to build an immersive experience just steps from the actual house.
“This was something that really occurred during the COVID years, when, like everyone else, our in-person programming was put on the shelf for a while, and we had a high demand for our content through digital resources,” McLaurin said.
“We began thinking about what a post-COVID opportunity might be to grow our exposure, rather than just our public programming, our seminars, our lectures, our conferences, and our publications. So, we began looking for a place in close proximity to the White House where we might open an education center and take advantage of the hundreds of thousands of people who come to Washington every year, as well as the people who live here.”
“We settled on the idea of an education center, not another museum. There are so many wonderful museums in Washington – the Smithsonian and others – that have objects under glass or historical documents that you can see, and that’s not what this is. This is an immersive, technology-based experience, and it’s a unique addition to the experiences here in Washington,” McLaurin told Yellowhammer News.
In September 2024, the WHHA opened its product to the public — The People’s House: A White House Experience.
The People’s House is a 33,000 square-foot facility that takes guests on a state-of-the-art technological journey through the White House and even boasts a to-scale Oval Office that will be routinely updated to mirror its across-the-street counterpart. Tickets are free and available to the public seven days a week.
President Donald Trump visited The People’s House gift shop late last month on an outing with White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles and was met at the door by McLaurin. In early August, Trump announced that he would donate the entirety of his $400,000 2025 salary to the WHHA to be used for White House renovations.
Since its founding in 1961 by First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy, the Association has seen a number of major changes to the building and the eighteen acres that make up the White House campus, but perhaps no modern president has shown as much interest in leaving a physical mark on the house as its current occupant.
Thus far, President Trump has installed an 88-foot-tall flagpole on each lawn, paved the center of the Rose Garden with limestone, added dozens of gold accents, mirrors, and paintings to the Oval Office, and announced plans to add a massive new ballroom to the building’s East Wing.
Asked about Trump’s changes to the building and the WHHA’s role in their planning and execution, McLaurin expressed confidence that the administration is enhancing the house, despite the level of controversy the updates have driven.
“There have been, going back to Thomas Jefferson, who made the first additions to the original White House, many things that have been added, from the North Portico to the South Portico, the Truman Balcony, the West Wing, the East Wing.”
“If you look back at each of those at the time, some of the public thought that it was great, some of the public didn’t like it, the press had commentary one way or the other, members of Congress had commentary, so this is not something new. Even though they seem like big changes and additions to us at this moment in time, that’s not unusual in a living White House, and how presidents have added their touches to it over time.”
“I think it’s terrific that a president is interested in both the history of the house and the mark that they want to make on it…Changes to the White House occur over time, and it’s part of the privileges and perks of being President of the United States. Even though the house is something that they only have temporary custody of, it’s really a place that, in my observation, has always been made better by the people who live there and add their own contributions to the house for those who will follow them in living there,” McLaurin told Yellowhammer News.
In times as politically fraught as these, one may assume that the White House Historical Association’s donor list would largely mirror that of the party that occupies the house, but McLaurin says that the people who keep the WHHA running largely have no problem putting preservation over partisanship.
“Our work and our focus is on the whole of the house, not as it is right now, but as it always has been, and our education work is not only focused on the current White House, but on the house when it belonged to James K. Polk, or Teddy Roosevelt, or Abraham Lincoln.”
“There’s nothing political, or policy-oriented, or partisan about what we do. We’re taking care of the house, we’re working with the current occupant, and our role and responsibility is the same regardless of who the president and the first lady may be,” McLaurin said.
“There are many people who support our work that I know are Republicans, there are many people who support our work that I know are Democrats, and there are a lot of people who support our work that I don’t have a clue what their politics are. They love the White House, they love our country, and they want it to be a special place for whomever the president may be.”
Somehow, between all of his work in Washington and frequent travel around the globe, McLaurin has also found the time to become an author. In 2021, he published a biography of James Hoban, the Irishman selected by President George Washington to design the President’s House.
Later this month, the Association will publish McLaurin’s latest book, “The People’s House Miscellany,” a 96-page work filled with history and little-known facts about the house. It is currently available for presale.
Riley McArdle is a contributor for Yellowhammer News. He is a Senior majoring in Political Science at the University of Alabama and currently serves as Chairman of the College Republican Federation of Alabama. You can follow him on X @rileykmcardle.
