Melinda Bates, the White House Insider

03/19/2026

03/18/2026

I'm very grateful for my career as a guest speaker on luxury cruise ships. I started with Celebrity Cruises SIXTEEN years ago - yes, I can hardly believe it myself!

I used to do six or more cruises with them a year, but that number has fallen off dramatically as I've become much busier with Viking, Silversea and Crystal - all of them providing me with a fabulous experience and the wonderful opportunity to share my stories of White House social history with people from around the world, who frequently tell me I am "the best speaker we ever heard."

Right now I am off Celebrity Silhouette, for 8 nights, which is an unusually short cruise for me. They especially like to have me onboard for International Women's Day, March 8, so I can give my talk about the Founding Mothers, the Revolutionaries!

Now I have 11 days until I travel to San Juan to join a Viking Ocean ship for a crossing to Barcelona, something I do for them every year now. The rest of the year I am busy with Silversea and Crystal, always such a treat!

https://www.vikingcruises.com/oceans/ships/viking-sea.html?cid=SEM|GGL|999|c_21887554238__&utm_id=sem:VOC-US-GGL-PMAX-HVA-tROAS&utm_term=&gclsrc=aw.ds&gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=21881046636&gclid=Cj0KCQjwmunNBhDbARIsAOndKpmS93ov1TdBYs3tsScJ7ZWVM95pe3JDI7_1t6tsty4DaoYaxblJK6QaAskBEALw_wcB

Sail on board the Viking Sea,an elegant, small ship designed to dock where larger ships cannot.

03/18/2026

My heart is broken.

The planned $400 million project has been a top priority for the president. Judge Richard Leon said he hopes to rule this month on whether to halt construction.

08/07/2025

Well, looks like they managed to take the "garden" out of the Rose Garden, producing a common patio space that I guess would be right at home at the Occupant's Florida property. I find this incredibly sad.

If you scroll down there's a gorgeous photo from 2014 showing it as an actual garden!

The newly renovated White House Rose Garden appears ready for use as a patio space after undergoing summer renovations to cover the Kennedy-era lawn — but that's not the only major change coming to the People's House

08/07/2025

For those of you who have wondered what exactly I do on those luxury cruise ships, here's one of my presentations recently recorded on a fabulous Crystal voyage. I hope you enjoy this walk through the White House as a privileged guest of the President and First Lady with an all-access pass!

Melinda Bates, Ultimate White House Insider, takes an audience along on her Private VIP tour of America's House, the same tour she gave to all the film and t...

07/31/2025

Trying reallllly hard here to separate my deep, deep disgust with anything related to the current Occupant from objective reality. And the reality is that yes, the White House is too small for hosting the many diplomatic events that take place there. HM the King can host upwards of 300 guests for dinner in a ballroom in Buckingham Palace (please check my math, Kris Hurd!) and who knows how many guests fit into a ballroom at the Kremlin or the Elysee Palace in Paris. So yes, many Presidents and First Ladies have used tents of various sizes set up on the South Lawn. And while they are always beautifully decorated with flowers and candles, gorgeous table covers, china and crystal, you are still aware that you have left the White House itself, which is a bit sad, isn't it?

So, an enormous ballroom, paid for by private funds, on its surface is not such a crazy idea. BUT. What will happen to those who traditionally work out of the East Wing, like the Visitors Office I had the honor of leading, and the First Lady's social office on the second floor? It's one thing to say they will temporarily move out during construction, it's quite another to see what the plan is for them once the ballroom is built. Maybe on a floor above?

I look forward to seeing the plans for this construction and hope with all my being it will not be decked out in Trumpian gold everywhere! And I guess it will sadly be unavoidable to name it after him, although so far they are saying "State Ballroom," and that's perfectly fine. It's sometimes difficult for those of us with a deep connection to the House, who love it and it's history, to remember that it is, in fact, a living House, and so it's not all that strange for it to occasionally change.

The project to construct a massive ballroom fulfills a wish for Trump, who has long disliked the tent pitched on the lawn to accommodate large-scale events.

05/23/2025

Very excited to have been offered two amazing bookings on fabulous Silversea vessels. One is a crossing from NY to the UK on May 29, so I had only a nine day turnaround, which is pretty tight even for me. But, unpack from one, then repack the same is not really all that hard. Always the main question is how warm or cold it will be crossing the Atlantic, anyone's guess. It was just really chilly everywhere we were in Canada on Viking Neptune, because clearly spring arrives a lot later up north. Hoping for warmth at the end of May and early June!

Then a crossing with them in November, heading back to the US.

In July I have back to back cruises on Crystal Cruises, in Greece, Italy and Turkey, my favorite places, on their exquisite ships, will be fabulous!

03/19/2025

https://www.washingtonpost.com/style/power/2025/03/18/oval-office-swedish-ivy-obama-plant-trump-missing-kennedy-gold-mantel/

I love this story because I am actually the person who started the fun tradition of saving and giving these cuttings. We were looking for an affordable (cheap) gift to give guests of the President and First Lady who had stayed in the Residence, or had some Oval visit. I looked at the plant and had an idea. I asked the WH chief gardener, Hey, what do you do with the clippings when you cut those plants back? "Nothing." "Ok, well, how about you save them for us and root them into little pots. Once they are established we can slap one of the gold foil Presidential seals on it, and attach a little tag we got the calligraphers to create for us. It was so lovely and they were so well received. I was really proud!

The Swedish ivy in the Oval Office — a fixture since at least the 1970s — was replaced with gold objects after Donald Trump took power again. What happened to the ivy?

02/19/2025

This is interesting. So sad about the delays /s/ for the current occupant. I'm just going to enjoy it a bit here, because I am petty and will take great joy in never having the current occupant get to use these planes.

During his first term, President Donald Trump ordered significant upgrades to Air Force One. But delays in construction mean that the new jets may not be ready until whoever is elected 48th president of the United States enters the White House.The New York Times reported Wednesday that Trump has bee...

10/25/2023

More information on tonight's State Dinner for Australia. Everything sounds delicious, but I will admit here that I am occasionally a messy eater, so I would NEVER choose to eat spare ribs while wearing an expensive evening gown! But that's just me.

First lady Jill Biden previewed the upcoming White House state dinner for Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, saying the inspiration for the dinner was the "vibrant Australian spring and crisp American autumn." White House Social Secretary Carlos Elizondo gave a detailed description of the e...

10/25/2023

Another fabulous Biden State Dinner is underway tonight. The menu sounds amazing. Well done, Carlos, Christeta and Suzy!

For the White House state dinner honoring Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, the Bidens enlist an Asheville, N.C., chef to showcase the South.