Children visiting the executive branch last week to attend a Halloween event were reportedly asked to use mock paper bricks to “build the wall."

According to Yahoo News, families of White House workers and other guests were invited to the Eisenhower Executive Office Building on October 25th for a kid-friendly Halloween party. And one anonymous attendee reportedly said that they were “horrified” to see that kids were invited to decorate red paper bricks and tape them to a display that read “build the wall.”

The party also included more traditional—and less overtly political—activities, including paper plane making and carnival games.

It’s not the first time the Trump administration has politicized a kid-centric event. In 2017, Trump gave a deeply political speech at the annual Boy Scout Jamboree. His recalled his 2016 Electoral College victory, urging the assembled scouts to "remember that incredible night with the maps and the Republicans are red and the Democrats are blue, and that map was so red, it was unbelievable,” and telling them that "under the Trump administration, you'll be saying 'Merry Christmas' again when you go shopping.” (The chief executive of Boy Scouts for America later publicly apologized for Trump’s remarks.)



The Eisenhower Building is next to the West Wing, and it's home to the ceremonial office of the vice president and houses White House staff members. Yahoo News asked a spokesperson for Vice President Mike Pence whether the display was appropriate for a kid’s party, and reported that the representative replied, "I have no idea. I’m not aware of it."

Gabrielle Bruney Gabrielle Bruney is a writer and editor for Esquire, where she focuses on politics and culture.

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