Democrats on Capitol Hill are raising alarm over large banners with President Donald Trump’s face that can be seen on three federal buildings, claiming they carry authoritarian undertones in the wake of a report from California Democratic Sen. Adam Schiff.
“When I saw the banners hanging from federal office buildings last week, it reminded me of [the] Communist Party in China and banners hanging from federal offices—just totally inappropriate and a step towards authoritarianism,” Democratic Rep. Hank Johnson from Georgia told CNN. “It’s another indication of the march that we’re on towards authoritarianism in this country.”
The report, released by Schiff earlier this week that alleges the administration is using federal funds for propaganda, found the Trump administration has spent at least $50,000 in taxpayer funds to create the banners, with the Department of Agriculture spending $16,400, Health and Human Services $33,726, and the Department of Labor around $6,000.
Schiff’s office, reached by CNN, said it did not have additional comment beyond the report. The California Democrat is known to have a particularly frosty relationship with the Trump White House.
But Republican lawmakers argued that similar promotional efforts took place under the previous Democratic administration – pointing to taxpayer-funded signage crediting then-President Joe Biden for federal projects, such as those related to his infrastructure law – and questioned why their colleagues didn’t raise concern then.
“Did they raise concerns when they were putting banners and stuff up when they were in the White House? I don’t recall that,” said Georgia Republican Rep. Barry Loudermilk. “ Why the double standard?”
The controversy underscores deepening tensions in Washington over the extent of Trump’s use of executive power. The banners in question have large portraits of the sitting president with the caption “American Workers First.”
The White House strongly pushed back on Schiff’s report, calling the senator a “serial liar.”
“You should ask Pencil Neck why he’s trying to draw comparisons between President Trump and fascist leaders when this is the exact same rhetoric that radicalizes the left’s supporters to commit acts of violence against conservatives,” White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson said in a statement to CNN.
The Department of Labor confirmed it spent roughly $6,000 on the banners and noted that they were created in conjunction with Labor Day and the department’s America250 celebrations.
The departments of agriculture and health and human services did not immediately respond to CNN’s requests for comment.
“The banners were originally displayed for Labor Day. After tremendous positive response, we’re reinforcing the material at no charge to taxpayers, so our big, beautiful banners can securely stay up in celebration of America’s 250th birthday,” Labor Department spokesperson Courtney Parella said in a statement.
Still, some Democratic lawmakers argued that no president, despite their party, should use taxpayer money for such displays moving forward.
“There shouldn’t be any money used for the president, really, any president, to go put their big picture up on the side of a building for any kind of political aggrandizement,” Rep. Joaquin Castro of Texas said. “Some of that stuff, it looks like we’re living in North Korea, the way they’re using money to put his big picture up. So yes, there should be more oversight, and it shouldn’t just apply to him. It should apply to future presidents.”
Dylan Hedtler-Gaudette, the government affairs manager at Project On Government Oversight, a nonpartisan ethics group, echoed the sentiment.
“I would hope that Congress would be a bit more kind of proactive and robust in terms of keeping tabs on what the executive branch and … what they’re doing with money and what they’re spending money on,” Hedtler-Gaudette told CNN.
Last year, Sen. Joni Ernst, an Iowa Republican, raised similar concerns about the use of taxpayer money for political messaging under the Biden administration. In a June 2024 letter to the White House Office of Management and Budget, she criticized the administration for encouraging federal agencies to post signage crediting “President Joe Biden” for publicly funded projects.
“For years I’ve been attempting to show Americans how Washington spends their hard-earned tax dollars by requiring a price tag displaying the cost be placed on public documents related to every government-funded project. This allows Americans to see the return on their tax dollars and judge the value of every expenditure for themselves,” Ernst wrote in the letter at the time.
Rep. Dusty Johnson of South Dakota pointed to pictures of the president and vice president often being displayed in federal buildings.
“Presumably, during the Biden administration, a picture of Joe Biden hung literally in every single federal building in America. Was that political? Did Mr. Schiff opine on that?” Johnson asked. “No, yeah, I haven’t seen the banner.”
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