Hundreds of guests packed the ballroom at Mar-a-Lago on Saturday night for a jungle-themed Halloween party, with President Donald Trump arriving in a red tie and navy suit rather than a costume. He told the crowd he had just 10 minutes to get ready, joking that other partygoers had spent nine hours on their elaborate looks. The scene in Palm Beach unfolded just three days before Tuesday's midterm elections, with Trump's approval ratings sitting near historic lows.
The jungle motif was everywhere, according to The New York Times, which described attendees in sequined leotards, elaborate headdresses and bright-feathered jungle-bird costumes. The party, held in the Mar-a-Lago ballroom, featured Alaskan king crab and a caviar bar alongside bongo drums and puppets, the paper reported. Some attendees posted photos showing a pen at the club holding a zebra and a miniature pony.
Trump Entertains Guests, Then Faces Reporters
Trump entertained guests throughout the night, mingling in the ballroom before stepping away to hold an impromptu press gaggle in the middle of the festivities, according to the same New York Times account. The informal briefing, described by the Daily Beast as an 11-minute back-and-forth, turned tense when a journalist asked whether Trump expected the country to return to war with Iran that week.
“Why would you ask such a stupid question?” Trump shot back, according to The Daily Beast. The exchange was brief, but it punctuated a night otherwise built around luxury food, costumes and the kind of spectacle Mar-a-Lago has become known for. The outlet noted the gaggle lasted just 11 minutes before the party resumed around him.
A Social Season Kickoff Amid Grim Poll Numbers
The Mar-a-Lago bash has traditionally marked the start of Palm Beach's social season, a framing offered by the Palm Beach Post ahead of Saturday's event. But this year's party landed against a starkly different political backdrop. A New York Times/Siena national poll conducted in mid-to-late October found just 36 percent of likely voters approved of Trump's performance, versus 59 percent who disapproved — his lowest rating in any Times/Siena survey, per the paper's reporting.
That same poll found likely voters preferred Democratic congressional candidates over Republicans by 11 percentage points in their districts. An Emerson College poll released the day before the party put Trump's approval at 37 percent, also described as the lowest the pollster has recorded for him, according to USA Today. The same Emerson survey showed Democrats leading Republicans by 10 points on the generic congressional ballot.
Republicans Brace for Tuesday
TIME reported that Trump's approval had fallen to 30 percent in early October, a level the outlet called the lowest of his second term and historically weak for a president heading into midterms. The magazine noted that most generic-ballot polling showed Democrats ahead, with Republicans facing a difficult overall environment. A PBS News/NPR/Marist poll cited in the same report found 91 percent of Democrats enthusiastic about the midterm election compared with 86 percent of Republicans.
Those numbers hang over Tuesday's elections, when Republicans face potential losses across the map. Days before the Mar-a-Lago gathering, the White House had announced a separate, more traditional Halloween event, with Melania Trump and the president opening the South Lawn to trick-or-treaters on October 29. The two scenes — a South Lawn candy giveaway and a caviar-and-crab affair among feathered costumes in Palm Beach — closed out a Halloween week that arrived with the president's numbers near their weakest point yet.
