White House rejects Donald Trump's offer to build $100 million ballroom 
 
 Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump smiles as he speaks during a campaign event at the Orpheum Theatre in Sioux City, Iowa, Sunday, Jan. 31, 2016. (Photo: Patrick Semansky, AP) 
 
 WASHINGTON — The White House confirmed Monday that Donald Trump had offered to spend $100 million on a new White House ballroom, but said the offer was quickly rejected. 
 
 "I'm (not) sure it would be appropriate to have a shiny gold 'Trump' sign on any part of the White House," Press Secretary Josh Earnest said. "That's what most of the buildings that he offers to build include, so I'm unclear if something like that would have been required with this offer as well." 
 
 "I can tell you that this was not something that was at all seriously considered," Earnest said. He said he could not provide details because "I was not the one who was consulted." 
 
 A White House ballroom suitable for state visits and other occasions is a longtime Trump hobby horse that reemerged Sunday, the last full day of campaigning before the Iowa caucuses. 
 
 In a campaign rally in Sioux City, Trump said he had offered to pay for the ballroom himself, and would get it built if he becomes president. 
 
 "We’ll get the top people, the top everything. We’ll have the best ballroom, because I notice they always put tents up on the lawn. No. 1, it’s not a good security thing. No 2, the guy that owns the tents is making a fortune,” he said. 
 
 Trump said he had previously approached the Obama administration to offer to pay for the ballroom, but never heard back. He said he made the offer through David Axelrod, a former White House senior adviser. 
 
 "He did offer to build one,” Axelrod told Time Magazine Sunday. "I don’t recall him saying he would pay for it. I passed his offer along to the social secretary.” 
 
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 In his final speech before Iowa caucus day, Donald Trump renewed his old promise to build a lavish White House ballroom and pay for it himself. 
 
 “Every time the top people come over from China … they put up a tent at the White House,” he said, during his final event Sunday in Sioux City, Iowa. “We’ll have a ballroom at the White House.” 
 
 He said he had long ago come up with a plan for the new facility. “We’ll get the top people, the top everything, we’ll have the best ballroom. Because I notice they always put tents up on the lawn. Number one, it’s not a good security thing. Number two, the guy that owns the tents is making a fortune,” he said. 
 
 
 
 Trump said he once called David Axelrod, a former senior adviser to President Obama, offering to build a ballroom worth “at least $100 million” for free. “We’ll put it someplace so it works contextually, magnificently,” Trump said of his construction offer. “I never heard back.” 
 
 Contacted by TIME Sunday night, Axelrod confirmed that Trump had contacted the White House about a ballroom. “He did offer to build one,” Axelrod confirmed to TIME in an email. “I don’t recall him saying he would pay for it. I passed his offer along to the social secretary.” 
 
 Read More: Why Trump Is Winning Over Christian Conservatives 
 
 This was not the first time Trump had made a new addition to the White House an issue in connection with his own presidential run. As far back as 2011, when Trump was flirting with a presidential campaign against Barack Obama, Trump had floated the idea of a White House ballroom on the Rush Limbaugh radio program. “We’ll go through committees. We’ll pick the one they like. We’ll pick the architect everybody likes. We’ll pick something that works. We’ll do 10 designs,” he said of his offer to the White House. “You’ll pick the one that’s the greatest with the greatest architecture. I will build it free. So that’s anywhere from 50 to 100 million-dollar gift. I will give that, and I mean, I’m talking, Rush — it’s the first time I’ve said this. I’m talking to the biggest person, one of the biggest people at the White House. I’m not talking to a low-level person.” 
 
 At his final event, Trump also attacked his main rival Texas Senator Ted Cruz during the Sioux City appearance, knocking him for a controversial mailer his team sent out designed to look like an official government document. “It’s so terrible, I’ve never seen anything like it,” Trump said. “It’s a fraud as far as I’m concerned.” 
 
 The latest Des Moines Register poll, released Saturday, found that Trump was leading the delegate race in Iowa, with 28% of likely caucus goers, compared with 23% for Cruz.
– The Obama administration said Monday it had turned down Donald Trump's offer to pay for a new $100 million White House ballroom, USA Today reports. "I'm (not) sure it would be appropriate to have a shiny gold 'Trump' sign on any part of the White House," says Press Secretary Josh Earnest. "That's what most of the buildings that he offers to build include." For his part, Trump said at a rally in Sioux City that a ballroom would be better than tents on the lawn for visiting dignitaries. "No. 1, it’s not a good security thing. No 2, the guy that owns the tents is making a fortune," he says. Trump had suggested the ballroom idea before but never heard back from the White House. "He did offer to build one," David Axelrod tells Time. "I passed his offer along to the social secretary."